Four companies with a major presence in New Jersey unveiled wage hikes or hiring sprees in recent weeks ahead of the holiday shopping season — even in the face of signs that the overall economy is slowing down.
Discount grocery chain Aldi — which has 62 stores in New Jersey — recently announced that it was hiring 13,000 store and warehouse staff for the holiday season, and increasing starting wages to $18 an hour for store employees and $23 for warehouse employees.
Bank of America said Tuesday that it was setting its minimum hourly wage at $24. "This move builds on the bank’s history of being a national leader in establishing a minimum rate of pay for U.S. hourly employees," reads a statement by Bank of America.
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Telecom giant Verizon, which is headquartered in Basking Ridge, announced it was taking on 1,000 new retail sales hires nationwide.
And off-price department store Burlington Stores, which has 45 locations in New Jersey — as well as its headquarters — is going on a 24,000-person hiring spree for the holiday shopping season.
Inflation is easing nationwide, having slowed to more than a three-year low of 2.9% on Wednesday, driven by falling prices in gasoline and used cars. Price increases in North Jersey cooled to 3.7%, the lowest rate of inflation since April, according to the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Previously, nationwide unemployment ticked up over the summer as hiring slowed because businesses tightened their belts amid high interest rates, fueling worries of a recession.
But Wednesday's inflation numbers likely bolster plans by the Federal Reserve to start lowering interest rates sometime this month.
New York recruitment and staffing firm Robert Half reported that over half of employers would be adding new positions in the fall and winter this year.
“Now that interest rates are dropping, capital costs will be dropping, there’ll be a new fire under the engine of economic growth,” said Vincent Vicari, who heads the Bergen County office of the New Jersey Small Business Development Center at Ramapo College in Mahwah.
Charles Steindel, New Jersey’s chief state economist during the Christie administration, was less optimistic. “It’s just a question of looking for qualified people,” he said. “Wages have been going up and they have to pay more.”
Year over year wages in the United States increased 4.7% in July, according to the Atlanta Federal Reserve — still below the nearly 7% increases seen during the Great Resignation coming out of the pandemic, but much higher than pre-COVID levels.
Hourly wages at small businesses, meanwhile — those with fewer than 50 employees — just decreased for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic, the Paychex Small Business Employment Watch said earlier this month.
“Falling below 3% for the first time in three years is another notable signal that the labor market is moving closer to its pre-pandemic level,” said Paychex President and CEO John Gibbons.
NJ unemployment rate was 4.7% in July
New Jersey’s unemployment rate in July was 4.7%, making it the sixth highest unemployment rate among all 50 states and Washington, D.C.
The state unemployment rate was 3.1% in August 2022, and the increase since then marked a sign that rising interest rates and corporate downsizing took a toll on the New Jersey economy.
The number of jobs in the private and public sectors in New Jersey shrunk by 10,300 between July 2023 and July 2024, according to federal jobs figures released through the New Jersey Department of Labor.
Unemployment numbers for the nation and New Jersey for August will be released at the end of next week.
“It’s going to be the most closely watched employment report in some time,” economist Michael Reid of RBC Capital Markets told USA TODAY.
A continuing increase in unemployment means it has become harder for jobless people to find positions, Reid said. That likely means they'll reduce their spending, hurting the economy.
This article contains information from USA Today
Daniel Munoz covers business, consumer affairs, labor and the economy for NorthJersey.com and The Record.
Email: munozd@northjersey.com ; Twitter: @danielmunoz100 and Facebook
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: 4 companies with major NJ presence unveil wage hikes or holiday season hiring sprees
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