Real (meaning inflation adjusted) Weekly Earnings of Production and Non-Supervisory Workers
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000031
This will be updated on Wednesday, August 10 830 AM ET when the CPI report comes out.
Nominal: Not inflation-adjusted:
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000030
This increased by 0.40% between June and July, so if the CPI comes in at higher than that, it will be a further drop in real wages. OTOH, the CPI could come in lower than that, given the drop in energy prices in the past 1 1/2 months or so. That would result in an upturn in real wages.
See Paul Krugman Op-Ed on expected decreases in inflation: https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=2952210
One problem with both these series is that they don't adjust for the kinds of workers that are losing or gaining jobs --
From: https://www.piie.com/blogs/realtime-economic-issues-watch/us-wages-grew-fastest-pace-decades-2021-prices-grew-even-more
The BLS releases ECI statistics (Employment Cost Index), showing compensation, wage, and benefit growth over the prior three months, four times a year. The ECI shows changes in wages and benefits in a manner that fixes the composition of the workforce. This is important, particularly when there are large changes in employment, because these data are not subject to the same distortions as the monthly average hourly earnings series, which can artificially be increased when low-wage workers lose their jobs and drop out of the sample (as happened in 2020) or artificially be decreased when these same workers are hired back (as happened in 2021) [1].
By fixing workforce composition, the ECI provides a more accurate picture of what is actually happening to wages.
Unfortunately, that report showed a drop of constant dollar (meaning inflation-adjusted) ECI in June (the latest) of minus 3.6% compared to 12 months ago. (compensation: -3.6%, wages: -3.5%, benefits: -3.9%)
#
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/eci.nr0.htm -- See table A, top 3 rows, far right column
# ECI website -
https://www.bls.gov/ect/
#
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/eci.pdf - lots of graphs
Another unfortunate, is that we won't see another update of this until late October.
= new reply since forum marked as read
