"Working class white men make less than they did in 1996"

[Xithras]

24. A number of Redditors also attributed part of it to college degree creep.

This topic was discussed extensively on Reddit last week, and several commentators made a very good point. The analysis draws the line between "working class" and "middle class" jobs along the "job requires a college degree" line. That's a questionable way to do the study, because there has been a tremendous amount of degree creep nationwide over the past 20 years. Skilled but degree-less jobs that filled out the upper end of the working class employment spectrum in 1996 overwhelmingly require a college degree today. It's very common for supervisory level jobs in the skilled trades, and often labor level positions in the trades, to have degree requirements for new hires.

By using a college degree as the defining line between the classes, the study shifted many higher paying 1996 working class jobs into the 2016 middle class column. It can be the same job, with the same payscale and same skillset, but the addition of a degree requirement shifts it to a higher class. By reclassifying many of the higher paying working class jobs this way, the working class average shifts downward even if NO real changes to compensation occurred.

I'm not saying that the pay decline isn't real (it is VERY real), but their methodology may be masking the real numbers.