The interesting things in this Bloomberg article are:
1.) Wal-mart thought it necessary to pay extra on only one day of of the two day weekend.
2.) Two states in the U.S., Rhode Island and Massachusetts, have state employment laws that mandate that employers pay hourly employees overtime for Sunday work (1.5 times their hourly rate).
3.) Survey indicates that approximately 20% of U.S. retailers offer some type of Sunday premium pay.
What this alludes to in not so subtle ways, is that in the United States the general norm is that people should not be working on Sunday, and if they do happen to work, they should be paid more than for the other six days of the week. Why are people expected not to work on Sunday? Most would hanker a guess that Sunday is the typical Christian day of worship and people should be going to church rather than working, and if they have to work, they should be paid extra for missing church.
We can see how this shows a general foundation upon which future laws will develop that make it illegal to work at all on Sunday. This will usher in major tribulation for those who choose to worship on the true seventh day Bible Sabbath - Saturday.
Dec. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the largest private employer in the U.S., plans to stop paying staff there an additional $1 an hour for working Sundays, taking a bite out of its single biggest expense.
The move, which takes effect next year, applies only to employees hired after Jan. 1, spokesman Greg Rossiter said in an interview yesterday. The move wouldn’t affect the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer’s 1.4 million current U.S. staff.
Since taking over almost two years ago, Chief Executive Officer Mike Duke has pledged to slow cost growth as the retailer copes with six straight quarters of sales declines at U.S. stores open at least a year. Operating expenses rose to about $80 billion last year, partly because of health benefits.
“It’s sad -- people who work on Sunday need that extra dollar,” Cynthia Murray, a Wal-Mart employee at a supercenter in Laurel, Maryland, said in an interview. Murray said she makes $11.20 an hour, and doesn’t work Sundays.
The move won’t apply to employees based in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Those workers weren’t eligible for the $1 extra pay because they get 1.5 times their hourly rate for Sunday work under state employment laws, Rossiter said. The retailer has 49 stores in Massachusetts and 10 in Rhode Island as of this month, according to its website. The change will take effect at Wal- Mart stores, Sam’s Club outlets and distribution centers.
“We regularly review our compensation programs and we are confident Wal-Mart’s pay and benefits are as good if not better than other retailers,” Rossiter said. He declined to say how much the company would save from the switch, nor would he disclose the number of employees who work on Sundays.
Changed Reality
Wal-Mart’s move reflects a change in workplace reality, said Craig Rowley, a vice president of the retail practice at the consulting firm Hay Group in Dallas. According to an annual survey conducted by Hay, only 20 percent of retailers still offer any sort of Sunday premium, Rowley said in an interview today.
“It’s a declining practice,” he said. “When retailers first started opening their stores on Sundays, it was common to have the premium because they were asking employees to do something they never had to do before. But today, working retail requires that you work weekends -- it’s part of the job.”
The average retailer has a 60 percent employee turnover rate, meaning it would need to replace that percentage of its workforce over the course of a year, according to Rowley. That compares with as much as 90 percent before the economic slump, he said.
