Workers at top 20 US low-wage firms rely on public assistance, report says

Many workers at some of the largest US corporations have no choice but to rely on healthcare and food assistance because of low wages, even as CEO compensation continues to grow, according to a new report released Wednesday.The report, published by the Institute of Policy Studies, focuses on 20 of the S&P 500 corporations that have primarily US-based workforces and report the lowest median wages of the group.Collectively, this “Low-Wage 20” employs 6.7 million people in the US. The median pay at a majority (75%) of the companies is lower than the income minimum for a family of three to be eligible for Medicaid in most states. At 13 of the companies, median pay was also lower than the Supplemental Nutrition Assistant Program income threshold for a family of three.Nearly a quarter of Walmart employees (29.3%) and half of Amazon workers (48.4%) in the Nevada – which collects Medicaid enrollment numbers among employees at large companies – were on Medicaid in 2024, according to the report.Among the four states that disclose Snap data related to large companies – Colorado, Massachusetts, Illinois, and Michigan – 10,920 Walmart workers and 9,633 Amazon workers were enrolled in Snap in 2024.The report noted Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” is expected to result in some 7.5 million Americans losing Medicaid and 4 million losing some or all of their Snap benefits after budget cuts.The corporations also spent massive mounts of stock buybacks in 2024, totaling $32.5bn. Lowe’s and Home Depot top the stock buyback list in the report, with Lowe’s spending $46.6bn on stock buybacks during this period, and Home Depot spending $37.9bn.Had all the companies spent that money to bolster worker pay, the wage of a million workers could have risen from $29,087 to $59,600 – the income level needed to afford the average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in the US, noted the report.Instead, average median pay among the “Low-Wage 20” declined from 2019 to 2024 when adjusted for inflation by 4.6%, from $30,474 to $29,087.Despite Starbucks offering a 401K matching program, many workers haven’t been able to afford the benefit: 45% of eligible employees had balances of zero in their plan accounts in 2024. That same year, Brian Niccol, the Starbucks CEO, had a compensation of $95.8m, compared to the median pay of $14,674, a ratio of $6,666 to $1.Average CEO pay across the 20 corporations reached $18.9m in 2024, with the average CEO to median worker pay ratio of $899 to $1 at these companies. The wealth of sixteen billionaires are tied to these 20 companies, including Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, eight members of Walmart’s Walton family and Howard Schultz, the former Starbucks CEO, the report noted.“When corporations can get away with shifting their employees’ basic living costs onto taxpayers, this is a form of corporate welfare,” said Sarah Anderson, director of the Global Economy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies and author of the report, in a statement. “With the federal government slashing spending on anti-poverty programs, it’s even more important that major corporations in the world’s richest country pay their employees a living wage.”A spokesperson for Amazon claimed their pay is among the best in the industry, retail. According to a 2024 report, Amazon employs 79% of the workforce in US warehouses with over 1,000 employees.“Pointing fingers at Amazon over Snap and/or Medicaid is a red herring when eligibility is based on total household income and size – and not individual wages,” said an Amazon spokesperson in an email. “As we’ve said for years, what really needs to happen is a significant and large increase in the federal minimum wage – that would be a big boost for American families.”Home Depot and Lowe’s did not respond to multiple requests for commentA spokesperson for Walmart said in an email “we offer a ladder of opportunity so people can build a career at Walmart, which includes a small percentage of our workforce that comes to us on public assistance. We hire them, train them and give them the chance to build a better life.”A spokesperson for Starbucks did not comment on the 401k citation but said the company provides benefits like healthcare, equity grants and tuition coverage, noting in an email that employees “stay with Starbucks at far higher rates than the retail average”.