Wal-Mart is grabbing headlines with a plan to elevate 35,000 workers to full-time from part-time and another 35,000 to part-time from temporary.
Be careful with this one because an announcement like this is designed for publicity and sounds like it’s more about retail strategy than stronger demand.
The U.S. workforce at Wal-Mart’s namesake and Sam’s Club warehouse chains fell by about 120,000 employees in the past five years, to about 1.3 million, according to regulatory filings. In that time, the company has added more than 500 U.S. stores through July 31. That workforce decline has coincided with customer frustration that there aren’t enough employees to keep shelves stocked, cash registers manned and shoppers’ questions answered.
In any case, an additional 35K full-time workers is some good news for the US.
