On Mar 6, 2007, at 10:12 AM, James Heartfield wrote:
> I don't ignore the figures Doug gave. He showed that median
> household income
> rose by 15 per cent between 1973 and 2005.
>
> He also showed that hourly wages fell by 11 per cent. But given
> that those
> dollars (as my table shows) bought more goods, hourly wages
> measured in
> consumer goods as opposed to dollars have not fallen.
James, what do you think "real" means in this context? It means corrected for price increases. So if real wages are down, they by definition don't buy more goods and services per hour of work - unless your omission of "and services" was deliberate, because services inflation is running at twice the rate of goods inflation (and services are about 60% of spending).
Household income rose in the face of declining hourly wages because more people have to work longer hours. Is that progress?
Doug