Starbucks is leading the way in mental health benefits for their employees by upping the yearly amount to $5,000.
A major coffee chain has taken a big step forward in mental health for their employees.
Recently, Starbucks has upped their mental health benefits to $5,000 a year for employees that work more than 20 hours a week.
It is a significant increase from the $400 that was previously offered.
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Starbucks also isn’t restricting the therapy covered, only requiring that staff see a licensed psychologist or social worker.
According to the Canadian Mental Health Association, mental disorders are health conditions that are characterized by alternations in thinking, mood, or behavior (or some combination thereof) associated with distress and/or impaired functioning.
Mackenzie Francoeur has been working at Starbucks for the past year, and believes that the upping of benefits will be good for all of the employees.
“Everyone has things that they’re dealing with in their lives, I’m happy to work for a company that is trying to combat mental health issues,” said Francoeur.
Mental health and wellness is important for all jobs, from nursing to teaching and every job in-between.
Emily Scheller is a nursing student and says that mental health benefits are extremely important as a wide number of Canadians suffer from various mental health issues.
“In order to be able to function properly in society mental health issues need to be addressed in ways of counselling, life skill workers, support systems and the cost of medication is high,” said Scheller.
Starbucks is leading the way for other retailers to help with mental health benefits.
Sam Scheller is in her first year of education and teaching degree and has learned just how important mental health is for students and employees.
“More and more students are on individualized education plans because of learning problems. Extra help for teachers would be able to help with students needs and their mental health,” said Scheller.
Starbucks has been leading the way for several years when it comes to helping their employees.
Back in 2014, Starbucks offered its baristas a shot at an online college degree, which was unusual as higher education is often out of reach for its workers.
The coffee chain partnered with Arizona State University to make an online undergraduate degree available at a steep discount, however this was only offered to the U.S. employees who worked at least 20 hours a week.
In addition to helping with education and mental health, the Starbucks Foundation has contributed $125,000 to help with relief efforts from Hurricane Matthew.
