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Poll Finds Workers Feeling Underpaid
According to the survey by staffing agency Randstad USA – taken with Harris Interactive – almost four in 10 employees think their companies pay less-than-market-rate salaries. That stacks up against 28% who responded that way last year, the Chicago Tribune reported.
The survey found that a growing number of employers
– 50% this year compared with 42% in 2005 – said they
believed their salaries were competitive with market
rates. The growing cutoff between workers and bosses
occurred at the same time as fewer employees reported
being satisfied with their workloads and hours.
That pressure contributes to feeling underpaid.
“Employers pretty much think their salaries are
competitive in the marketplace, and they may be,” said
Eric Buntin, managing director of marketing and
operations for Randstad USA, in the newspaper. “But pay
may not be keeping up with the increasing costs we’ve
been experiencing, especially in the last six months with
dramatically higher gas prices. The productivity gains
employers and employees agree are so important may not be
translating into [higher] wages.”
Real wages for most private sector employees peaked in
mid-2003, according to surveys by the US Department of
Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Generation Y, defined by Randstad as those born between
1980 and 1987, is least interested in pay increases.
Learning new skills is most important to the youngest
generation of workers. Thirty-one percent ranked learning
new skills as “extremely” or “very” important, compared
with 27% who said pay increases were paramount.
Nineteen percent, more than any other generation, valued
a career path, yet only 3% consider increased
responsibilities very important.
Harris conducted the survey for Randstad in late February and early March by polling an online panel of about 1,600 employees and nearly 1,300 employers.
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