The Myth of Stagnant Wages

not a myth

The lower wage earner crowd really is not interested in wealth redistribution so much as they are some income equality in the form of manageable cost of living to income ratio. Wages are declining in actual valve but what hurts is the cost of living in the form of housing and energy going up so much. The mortgage sector and those in concert with them have pushed real estate out of the reach of a large segment of our working class, the inflated industry has now taken us to the brink of economic collapse. Sorry, that is the fault of investors and the like. Now they are getting rewarded for their greed with billion dollar bailouts while the gullable working man gets manipulated once again by lieing polititions who promise to fix it all and then they go on their merry criminal way once they achieve their primary objective, getting elected, without producing ANY of the solutions that got them in office. You capitalist have one very bad weakness, GREED!

Daniel A Henry of VA @ Dec 22, 2008 11:48:41 AM

Too Small to Succeed

For years I bought the Neocon lies about free markets being self-regulating, the American dream of self-reliance and opportunity, and that less government-- even and including less regulation-- was good for everyone.

Then I watched as PAC money and lobbyists coopted every representative sent by the people, as CEOs and Directors manipulated national policy to augment their bottom lines with money the government took from me at the point of a gun, and noticed that while Democrats and Republicans could both be bought, Republicans tended to stay bought longer. The real Bush agenda for the last eight years has seemed to be "No corporation left behind.". Now you tell me that wages have actually gone up?

Hell of a job, Brownie.

W J Rorie of AZ @ Dec 16, 2008 15:36:20 PM

Neocon fantasy land

Government overstates inflation? CPI has an upward bias?

Ha ha ha ha ha! You crack me up!

orangutan @ Nov 22, 2008 23:43:05 PM

Stagnant wages, no myth

Yes! The entire 30 year economic experiment ( for the greater number of us ) of low taxes, free trade, and less regulation making millionaires began by Thatcher and Reagan has been and continues to be a failure. You are entitle to your opinion but not to your own facts. Wake up America! We work more we get less. The Great ownership society is a big scam. Is a cook book!

Bolivar Ona of NY @ Nov 19, 2008 10:56:56 AM

Mr Pethokoukis:

It is not a myth but a fact. Yes a fact. It is only controversial to Bush apologists who like to make up reality. Go to BLS.for data or BEA.gov for data.

Why would we listen to anyone on your side when you like to cherry pick any information and then market it to us like we were a bunch of 4th graders. This doesn't fly anymore.

You sentence "before you consider the data I have compiled..." Why would we consider your cherry picked data. It is out there for all of us to see, and not through you rose colored lens.

Carl Lewis of OR @ Oct 31, 2008 17:26:18 PM

Hype

The question is - Are you one of the "journalists" that the Bush Administration pays for articles?

If not, then I suggest you put your wet finger to the wind and see that that more and more ordinary people are on to what is going on here.

The days when playing Uncle Tom for the Man - telling those of us in the field what the massa wants us to think - would go unnoticed are over.

You are Uncle Tom.

You shuck and jive for the man and you get to live in the house.

Check your history and see how that worked out in the late 1800's.

You'll join us - or go down with them.

Confess! Repent!

Before it's too late.

Elvis of NC @ Oct 26, 2008 18:18:07 PM

Stagnant Wages

" Why does access to our increasingly technologically sophisticated healthcare system not count as improving our standard of living?"

Has the writer forgotten that tens of millions of Americans cannot afford most of that high-tech healthcare which he tells us about? If all of that great jealthcare where added to our standard of living, those numbers would really bad.

Psychotic1 of CA @ Oct 17, 2008 19:32:24 PM

Time for a Myth Reality Check

"Myth of Stagnant Wages" huh? My wife and I've worked in Customer Service for 10 yrs and our wages have been absolutely flat for the entire decade. In fact, I make LESS compared to ten years ago.

My wife is making the exact same wage she earned in 1994 as an Admin Asst. Working for a major AZ university she now has MORE duties, more responsibilities and more people for the same pay.

My ex-coworkers; all CSRs at Charles Schwab, Sprint, Verizon and T-Mobile are making LESS than they made in 1998! So I don't buy your article's "myth" premise one iota. Ask the man in the street, he knows all about stagnant wages. Its a sad reality.

At the contact center where I work I see ex-company managers and ex-executives working as CSRs just to put bread on the table for their families. After one whole year on the floor our staff MAY get a .19 cent per hour raise.

At my wife's old firm Senior Engineers with 401Ks have been let go and replaced with newly-minted kids right out of tech college at half pay. Her old boss (the firm's partner) has NO admin. assistant. He does his own office work.

Meanwhile the Democrats get bashed for speaking the truth. May I suggest you talk with people in the trenches before offering such an off-center opinion?

Have your wages gone up?

Rob of AZ @ Oct 16, 2008 22:04:24 PM