On Mon, 6 Dec 2004, Doug Henwood wrote:
> According to Business Week, a BLS consultant has developed good data on
> Chinese pay rates, which hadn't been available before. In dollar terms,
> including fringe benefits, the average U.S. manufacturing worker earns $21.11
> an hour; the average Chinese worker, $0.64 (3% as much).
Doesn't this make hash out of the central contention of mainstream economics, that wages are set in accordance with relative productivity? Can anyone seriously maintain that Chinese manufacturing workers are 1/33rd as productive as American ones?
Michael