By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – McDonald’s (NYSE:MCD) shares were up 1% Thursday after the company raised its hourly wages to strengthen its workforce in a tight labor market.
The fast-food restaurant operator is raising wages for company-owned restaurants in the U.S. by an average of 10%, aiming to hire 10,000 people over three months at those outlets.
Unemployment remains high even as companies struggle to find help.
The company’s management had indicated a wage hike at its earnings conference call on April 29.
“And so, we're working through what some changes in our company-owned restaurants might look like from a wages and compensation perspective. We think the external environment is right to do this. We think the internal environment is also right to do this. And we think it's actually a great business decision for us,” Joseph M. Erlinger, President, McDonald's USA, said in the call.
Erlinger was responding to a question on what the company was doing to overcome staffing issues.
On Monday, Philadelphia area McDonald's said it would host a Drive-Up Hiring Day, offering candidates a new way to apply. Most restaurants were aiming to hire about 10 new team members per location before summer, about 2,500 available job opportunities across the region.