Some organizations offer poor employee benefits and are often in line with their industry type. Organization types that have the worst offerings are below
When choosing where to work, many employees focus on the additional benefits they will receive in addition to the standard pay compensation package. However, in some industries, the additional benefits on offer are minimal or non-existent. Industries such as retail, construction and the service industry rarely offer additional work benefits to their employees above the standard pay for the hours that they work. There is a clear connection between hourly paid workers and poor additional benefits when compared to salaried workers. A good benefits package appears to go hand in hand with the skills an employee has to offer. In industries such as technology, banking and healthcare most employees are highly skilled in their field and are often hard to replace. Employers have a greater desire to retain the best employees over the lesser hourly paid workers in the blue collar and manual industries. In industries such retail and other service industries, employees are transitioning from job to job, trying to pay for college or simply trying to make basic ends meet. In addition to the transitional nature of these employees, comes the automation of their jobs which will mean that those jobs may not even exist in the future. Employees are being replaced by touch screen menus in restaurants, online shopping and also more recently retail stores that do not physically sell items to the public and are just experiential retail.
Various Industries and the Employee Benefits They Offer
Retail Industry Employee Benefits
The retail industry is made up of many low-paid, part-time employees and this industry very rarely provides a decent employee benefits package above the state and federal minimums. In this industry, employees are constantly in transition, moving from one job to another, and it is simply too expensive for the employer to offer a wide range of decent benefits. The most common compensation other than pay in the retail industry is discounted prices on merchandise and access to special clearance sales that are not available to the general public. Any health, dental, retirement or 401k benefit that might be offered to white collar counterparts is usually only available to long term employees who are higher up in the larger companies or who long tenure.
Construction Industry Employee Benefits
Employees in the construction industries are among the lowest compensated employees. Even though the work that they do can be among the most dangerous jobs, they are rarely rewarded for it. In many cases, construction workers work for small companies or are self-employed so employee benefits are not at the top of the list of priorities. However, this is beginning to change, as technology begins to take over, many of the skilled construction workers are seeking new opportunities so in order for larger construction companies to maintain a skilled work pool, they are beginning to think about the employee benefits that are offered and are rolling them out in a sporadic fashion.
Service Industry Employee Benefits
Employees in the service industries are often poorly compensated in terms of employee benefits. Even when employee benefits are offered they are often low quality and employees may not choose to enroll in the programs. That being said, some companies such as Costco and Trader Joe's are beginning to see the value in offering their employees perks and benefits to keep them happy at work, but it is still not the norm. In addition to little or no benefits, employees in industries such as retail and service are often fairly low paid making it safe to say, that the people who need the greatest help, always get the worst employee benefits.