this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2024
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They're catching up with the recent pace, which is back down (i.e. 3.3%), not the post-2020 pace. It still hasn't caught up.
As you quoted:
Hm - I interpreted "recent" as one way, but yeah, that's fair, you could interpret "recent" as him meaning the last year or something. Here's a summary, then, of how wages at the bottom end have kept pace with inflation over the last few years. "Real wages of low-wage workers grew 12.1% between 2019 and 2023." Cumulative inflation over that time span has been about 18% (which is massive), but low-end wages in current dollars also grew by 35% cumulatively in that time, well outpacing inflation.
What numbers are you looking at that say low income wages haven't kept pace with inflation? Like what kind of cumulative current-dollar wages, and what cumulative inflation, are you claiming? If my stuff is propaganda numbers, then what are the real numbers?
Inflation-adjusted wages have ticked very slightly down at the median (like a few percent), gone down a bit at the top end, and gone up significantly both at the bottom end and in the average. It's a complex topic and you can find a variety of numbers both on the income and inflation sides, but they generally all paint that same story (which is, itself, complex enough that you can paint a bunch of different narratives from it, by putting up the numbers for average vs. median vs. lowest-quartile or etc).
That's real wages (inflation adjusted dollars). I.e. Wages at the bottom end have outpaced inflation by 12.1%. That's why I quoted that sentence in my message...
To get current dollars you would do 1.121 * 1.18 - 1 = 32% growth in current-dollar wages (where 1.121 comes from 12.1% cumulative constant-dollar wage gain, and 1.18 comes from 18% cumulative inflation). I saw 35% somewhere else instead of 32%; like I said there are small differences, but that overall broad picture is the same from all sources I've seen.
So, you're not clear on the difference between current dollar wages and constant dollar wages, but you're lecturing me on what is the real economic picture is that I'm not understanding? Okay, so tell me. What are you saying is happening? Have I understood you correctly that you claim current dollar wages have risen by only 12%?
And yes, lower income people in this country are still fucked. If anything I was saying made it sound like I thought they were not, that was not the intent. My point was that Biden has been helping them get out of it, to a certain degree, in a way that's actually very unusual for an American president (they generally don't give a shit about the working class). And that happened even during a historic level of economic challenge to tackle his way out of. And therefore that attacking him by pretending that the opposite is happening is erroneous at best and openly dishonest at worst.
Bruh, you are throwing around back of the napkin math, and you are not impressing anyone with it.
Your own sources say that the groups who saw the most wage gains are still unable to make a livable wage.
It is not a healthy economy or society.
You are obfuscating.
I am pointing out that, as far as I can tell, you made a fundamental error of confusing inflation-adjusted wages for non-inflation-adjusted wages, leading your entire point to be backwards from what your own source was claiming. And so I asked you what's up with that, and if you want to explain, or if I have misunderstood anything.
You choosing not to explain (but instead abandon the details completely and insult the whole concept of doing math to demonstrate or understand something) pretty much provides the answer, to me. But sure! Keep going about how I'm just spouting propaganda that doesn't match the factual reality. The more that you can take it into the realm of us just being hostile and condescending to each other, I think, the further away from "hey let's look at the facts and what's actually going on," and the better for you (and that tactic is working to a certain extent, I think.)
Saying low income workers in America don't make a living wage, and that it's not a healthy economy or society, I'll 100% agree with. Pretty sure I made that clear already, but if I did not, there it is again.
I understand the difference between nominal wages and inflation-adjusted just fine. That you keep using the nominal wage increase of 35% is dishonest, without providing any context, which you keep not doing, or even directly claiming it was Biden's doing, which it was not:
Wage growth at the bottom happened because low-wage workers realized during the pandemic that they could survive without their bottom-wage jobs, which gave them the leverage to demand higher wages when bottom-wage jobs opened back up.
You brought 20% cumulative inflation into it, which is perfectly fair to do of course. But then, after that, I brought in 35% cumulative current-dollar wage growth, because for me to say 12% might sort of invite a comparison between the 20% and the 12%.
Okay, so now you are agreeing with 35% cumulative current-dollar wage growth, right? It sounds like. Nailing down individual facts with you is a little bit arduous it seems like. I'm honestly just gonna completely leave aside what you seemed like you were saying about the 12%, and how much of what happened is Biden's doing versus not, just to keep things simple.
Okay, so. You're agreeing now (right?) with 35% or 32% or whatever, just saying it was dishonest without context. So. Have I understood that correctly? And if so, what did you mean when you said:
To me, low-income wages caught up and blew past the giant price jumps from the pandemic (although, yes, the lowest income segment of American society is still way too big and still needs a ton of help; on that we agree). Median wages have kept pace within a couple of percent. Average wages have kept pace with and exceeded the giant price jumps from the pandemic. So, what did you mean by this? Like what are the numbers and metrics for the part that "never caught up"?
I am sorry to seem like I'm hammering on this one point, but me just starting to talk about how this one statement was inaccurate led to this whole extensive argument and multi message sustained bickering and all sorts of new topics and arguments, but that wasn't me that did all that. I was just saying, no, that one statement is just factually not accurate, and it seems like we're just now getting back around to where we can factually talk about it.