Donald Trump: wages are 'too high'

[Benton]

(11-13-2015, 02:06 PM)EatonFan Wrote: This is true.  If you think you are worth more, then show those skills and prove you are worth more.  If your current job does not allow you to support yourself -- look for another one that will.  Gaining skills will never hurt anyone. 

Beyond this the real problem is how government structures its benefits.  The incentive is to stay in a certain income range (an income box).

If you take government benefits into account (and treated them as compensation) I'd bet wages have risen in the last 25 years instead of being flat. 

What are some of these benefits?

Earned income credit
Additional child tax credit
Daycare
HUD housing
Utility subsidies
'Free' YMCA memberships
Food stamps
Cash assistance
Medicaid
Student Aid


There's more.

The problem with every one of those programs is that in order to get them you must keep your income low -- IN the box.  Both parties support these programs, but for different reasons.

I dunno. Those benefits are largely for those in the bottom-most brackets. Like Matt, that's pretty much out the window for a lot of us who have decent jobs. I've got two kids and pretty soundly in the middle class, but I don't qualify for any of that outside of possibly the child tax credit (I know we deduct medical expenses, but I generally stay out of the tax stuff for our household, I've got enough of that at work).

Those benefits have increased, I'm sure, for the lower earners, but that doesn't do anything to offset the wage and hiring freeze my company has. I guess eventually if the wages don't come up, I'll qualify for social aide. Which is a depressing thought.


http://www.epi.org/publication/a-decade-of-flat-wages-the-key-barrier-to-shared-prosperity-and-a-rising-middle-class/

Quote:

• According to every major data source, the vast majority of U.S. workers—including white-collar and blue-collar workers and those with and without a college degree—have endured more than a decade of wage stagnation. Wage growth has significantly underperformed productivity growth regardless of occupation, gender, race/ethnicity, or education level.
• During the Great Recession and its aftermath (i.e., between 2007 and 2012), wages fell for the entire bottom 70 percent of the wage distribution, despite productivity growth of 7.7 percent.
• Weak wage growth predates the Great Recession. Between 2000 and 2007, the median worker saw wage growth of just 2.6 percent, despite productivity growth of 16.0 percent, while the 20th percentile worker saw wage growth of just 1.0 percent and the 80th percentile worker saw wage growth of just 4.6 percent.
• The weak wage growth over 2000–2007, combined with the wage losses for most workers from 2007 to 2012, mean that between 2000 and 2012, wages were flat or declined for the entire bottom 60 percent of the wage distribution (despite productivity growing by nearly 25 percent over this period).
• Wage growth in the very early part of the 2000–2012 period, between 2000 and 2002, was still being bolstered by momentum from the strong wage growth of the late 1990s. Between 2002 and 2012, wages were stagnant or declined for the entire bottom 70 percent of the wage distribution. In other words, the vast majority of wage earners have already experienced a lost decade, one where real wages were either flat or in decline.
• This lost decade for wages comes on the heels of decades of inadequate wage growth. For virtually the entire period since 1979 (with the one exception being the strong wage growth of the late 1990s), wage growth for most workers has been weak. The median worker saw an increase of just 5.0 percent between 1979 and 2012, despite productivity growth of 74.5 percent—while the 20th percentile worker saw wage erosion of 0.4 percent and the 80th percentile worker saw wage growth of just 17.5 percent.