Dive Brief:

• Target will pay $500 bonuses to all hourly team members in stores, distribution centers, headquarters and field-based offices, it announced Jan. 25.
• The move is the third time Target rolled out bonuses for front-line workers "for going above and beyond during the pandemic," and its fifth round of such bonuses overall, according to its announcement.
• Store directors, executive team leaders and salaried distribution center leaders will receive bonuses ranging from $1,000 to $2,000. In total, Target will pay out $200 million this round, it said.

Dive Insight:

Target said it has recently worked to demonstrate gratitude to employees in various ways. In July, it raised its starting minimum wage in the U.S. to $15, making good on goals stated three years earlier.

The company also expanded its benefits earlier in the pandemic and will keep those benefits for now, it said: it waived its attendance policy for coronavirus-related illness; offered free access to virtual health care; granted free backup care to employees in the U.S.; and more.

While some in other spaces last year froze salaries, many employers with essential workers moved to adopt hazard pay and bonuses. Some have since ended those offerings, with much backlash from worker advocates. President Joe Biden last month called on grocers, in particular, to award workers back hazard pay.