Amazon is expected to cut 18,000 jobs, with consumer retail and HR bearing the brunt of job losses.
Amazon is expected to cut 18,000 jobs, with consumer retail and HR bearing the brunt of job losses, while Microsoft workers in the US now receive unlimited time off. On the remuneration front, Apple CEO Tim Cook has accepted a massive pay cut. This as the International Labour Organization predicts a dismal global jobs growth of one percent this year.
Unlimited leave for Microsoft’s US workers
Microsoft’s US workers will get unlimited time off, as of 16 January, in line with changes in the company’s leave policy. Only full-time employees in the US are eligible.
Companies like Netflix and Goldman Sachs have similar leave policies in place.
Unlimited time can also be a boon for employers because the plan requires less work to administer and because employees who quit or are fired don’t have to be compensated for accrued, unused time, Bloomberg reports. Microsoft will make a one-time payout in April to workers with accrued time.
Apple CEO takes massive pay cut
Apple CEO Tim Cook will receive a pay cut this year, to $49 million (R835 million) in total compensation, the company said.
The multinational tech company’s compensation committee said it made the change in response to last year’s say-on-pay vote, in which 64 percent of shareholders approved of Cook’s compensation, compared to 95 percent in the 2020 fiscal year.
The Apple board praised Cook’s performance, and said it has confidence in the CEO’s long-term strategic decisions, reports CNBC.
Amazon to cut more than 18,000 jobs
Amazon, which employs 1.5 million people, plans to cut more than 18,000 jobs. It is not yet clear which countries will be affected by the decision.
Most of the job losses will come from its consumer retail business and its human resources division, reports the BBC.
Amazon started laying off staff as early as November, according to LinkedIn posts by workers who said they had been affected by job cuts.
ILO sees global jobs growth at one percent in 2023
The International Labour Organization (ILO) sees global employment growth slowing to one percent this year, compared to two percent in 2022.
At the same time, the number of unemployed people in the world is expected to rise by three million to 208 million in 2023, while inflation will eat into real wages, the ILO said in a report on global trends.
“The slowdown in global employment growth means that we don't expect the losses incurred during the COVID-19 crisis to be recovered before 2025,” said Richard Samans, director of the ILO’s research department.
According to the report, the current slowdown means that many workers will have to accept lower quality jobs, often at very low pay, sometimes with insufficient hours and “as prices rise faster than nominal labour incomes, the cost-of-living crisis risks pushing more people into poverty”.
