With inflation at a record high of 9.1%, employees are desperate for raises.
Technically, this should be doable. Corporate profits are up 8.7% from the start of the year, and they’re projected to grow 10.6%, according to data from Bloomberg.
But don’t hold your breath for a raise—that is, unless you’re a top performer. According to a new survey of 130 CEOs and CFOs from Gartner, 51% say that they plan on only increasing salaries for top performers. Only 28% of organizations are planning on raises for everyone, while 19% will only do raises for employees in select markets.
The news is a little better for employees with hourly wages: 35% of organizations said they would raise wages for everyone, and 32% said they would raise wages for hourly workers in select markets.
CEOs and CFOs are not completely unaware that pay is the key to retention: 43% said they were planning on using one-time bonuses to keep employees, and 39% said they were planning on at least partially pegging pay adjustments to inflation, according to the survey.
“Many employees expecting pay adjustments that fully compensate for cost-of-living increase may be disappointed,” said Randeep Rathindran, a vice president of research at Gartner, in a statement. “It’s clear that organizations are attempting to buy more time to read the tea leaves between persistently high inflation, the threat of recession, and the state of the labor market before making significant strategic shifts.”
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