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Last week, Retail Brew reported on how the pandemic forever changed worker responsibilities. Now, we’re digging into what the labor force looks like.
For starters...retail workers are more likely to be young, women, POC, and lower-income. Here’s a snapshot, per a US Census report released in September.
In 2018, 9.8 million people—or 6.3% of the total labor force—worked in retail:
- More than 50% were between 16 and 34, and ~56.5% were women.
- Black people made up 12.5% of the retail workforce, but held 11.4% of jobs overall. Hispanic people represented 18.7% of the retail workforce, but held 17.5% of overall jobs.
- 10.1% of retail workers lived in poverty, compared to 6% of all workers.
Now consider that these were the workers disproportionately affected by the pandemic.
- POC were 1.3x more likely to lose their jobs, Vivek Sharma, CEO of InStride, told Retail Brew. Women were 4x more likely to be laid off.
Pay attention: Looking at wages, workers across the board aren’t properly compensated in relation to their labor input, Jenny Weissbourd, associate director of the Workforce Strategies Initiative at the Aspen Institute, previously told Retail Brew.
"Too often, the frontline retail roles disproportionately held by women and BIPOC workers do not provide economic stability or a path to mobility," Weissbourd said.
- Per the Census report, full-time cashiers earned a median of $22,109 a year. That figure was less than half of the $48,565 earned by the broader labor force.
Pay rates have come into focus over the past year, particularly as companies struggle to fill retail and restaurant jobs amid a labor crunch (and are boosting wages as a result).
Executive decision: The diversity we see on the floor isn’t reflected in management. In 2019, women held only 14% of executive positions at retail and consumer companies, per McKinsey. It’s crucial that changes—and quickly, Sharma said, since exec decisions affect the staff.
- Amazon, for example, instituted new diversity targets for 2021 that include hiring 30% more women in senior technical jobs and doubling high-level Black employees. (Though Amazon’s Black employees say its HR department is falling short.)
- Gap and Walmart have also made promises to improve representation within their ranks.
Zoom out: Throughout the pandemic, frontline workers have been put in the precarious position of rule enforcers. Gap, Dick’s, H&M, American Eagle, and more have joined a campaign to prevent customer mistreatment of floor staff and sales associates, who are often POC.—KM