Have your wages increased? NY Times says "Long a Laggard, Wages Start to Outpace Prices"

[Herman Munster]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/08/business/08wage.html?hp&ex=1165640400&en=a06bab73a4abd4d6&ei=5094&partner=homepage

After four years in which pay failed to keep pace with price increases, wages for most American workers have begun rising significantly faster than inflation. With energy prices now sharply lower than a few months ago and the improving job market forcing employers to offer higher raises, the buying power of American workers is now rising at the fastest rate since the economic boom of the late 1990s.

The average hourly wage for workers below management level — everyone from school bus drivers to stockbrokers — rose 2.8 percent from October 2005 to October of this year, after being adjusted for inflation, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Only a year ago, it was falling by 1.5 percent. In recent years, many Americans grew anxious about the future and economists questioned whether the recovery from the 2001 recession would ever produce genuine gains for ordinary workers.

The fall in unemployment to 4.4 percent and the recent surge in wages, however, raise the prospect that the job market could be on the brink of another strong run, much like the one that lifted incomes in the late 1990s. “The labor market is pretty tight right now, so it’s not a huge surprise that we’ve started to see big wage gains,” said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist for the research firm Global Insight. “I think the big surprise is that it took so long.”

Still, there are a number of economic forces at work that raise doubts about whether the recent gains are the start of another boom. It is also possible, economists say, the improvement may turn out to be little more than a temporary spike. For now, though, with the number of unemployed Americans actively seeking work at a five-year low, help-wanted signs are proliferating again and many businesses are having a harder time finding employees.

[Drum]

1. No. nt

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. No.

[SteppingRazor]

3. Sure they have -- once a year, like always

Whether they outpace the increase in prices, however, I'm not sure.

[rfranklin]

4. Horse puckey! Wages would have to rise 400% to keep up with...

the top 1% of the population. And at least 50% to equal the buying power that working people had twenty-five years ago (before the "Reagan Revolution" attacked unions.)

[OzarkDem]

5. Too little, too late

Sorry, but all the years of the Bush economy and the recent energy price outrages, a little bump in income isn't going to make any difference for all the Americans who are up to their eyeballs in debt.

[Demeter]

6. HAHAHAHAHA

I contract with the company that distributes the NYTimes, and just before gasoline prices started to climb, they insisted on breaking the existing contract ($20/day/route) and substituting a piecework rate. The routes shrank in size as people fled Michigan for jobs, and now my income is down $120/month, not counting the elevation in gasoline prices.

So no, my income is down, and it will remain down, since the local economy sank on 9/11 and has yet to show any sign of recovery. If there were other work available, my disabled child's need for care would make it impossible for me, even if I were considered qualified for anything anymore.

Oh, NYTimes had a 25% price increase--needless to say, none of that drifts down to the carriers.

[nosmokes]

7. this article hasta be a plant

and JEREMY W. PETERS and DAVID LEONHARDT hafta be bushco operatives. nobody i know has gotten any sort of signifant pay raise in the last3 years.maybe things are different on the east coast?

[Warpy]

8. Maybe when they average peon wages with CEO wages

This is just an article paid for by the fat cats to prevent a minimum wage increase.

I'd also like to know what alternate universe has all those jobs. University grads here in central NM are still begging to be allowed to sell shoes.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

9. You've got to be kidding

Haven't had a raise in 2-3 years, and with my husband now unable to work due to health reasons, our income has been cut by 2/3 (yeah, he was making that much more than me).

[radfringe]

10. no

company I work for just give 3% raise per year, this is usually wiped out by an increase in the health insurance co-pay a month after the raises come through

[Richard Steele]

11. Good lord, who do they think they're kidding with this utter BS?

EVEN IF IT'S TRUE, look at it this way:

If you and I are in a very long car race,
and my car has gone 10 or 20 percent FASTER than yours
for more than FOUR YEARS (and probably six)...

A few months where your car goes half a percent faster than
mine WILL NOT put you in the lead. In fact, you'd need
to maintain that for OVER A HUNDRED YEARS just to pull up
alongside me.