More Economic Roots of Political Anger

This is a syndicated repost courtesy of RealityChek. To view original, click here. Reposted with permission.
Some more data has just come out from the government on how much Americans have been making at the workplace lately, and if you work with them with a little intelligence, you can see what a lousy economic recovery the middle and working classes have experienced. P. S. Do you think that at least some in their ranks might be supporting Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump?
The statistics come from the Labor Department’s series on total employee compensation. They’re not adjusted for inflation, but they include everything from wages and salaries to benefits to the monetary cost of paid leave, vacations, and the like.
For the broadest groups examined – like ‘all private sector workers’ – the numbers provide some support for widespread claims that low recent jobless rates are finally tightening the labor market enough to drive up pay strongly. For example, although overall compensation between the fourth quarters of 2014 and 2015 rose by a mediocre 1.21 percent, the two previous comparable annual increases of 2.63 percent and 5.70 percent respectively. These average out to advances that are quite respectable by historical standards. (The data, though, only go back to 2004.) They certainly represent a faster advance than that for the three years before – 1.20 percent, 2.95 percent, and 1.05 percent respectively.

This post was published at Wall Street Examiner by Alan Tonelson ‘ March 12, 2016.