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Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

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181–190 of 354 posts

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Riding salaries do not lead to inflation by themselves. What leads to inflation is the increase in money circulating on the market This is nonsense. If an economy doubles and the money supply grows 10%, you get deflation. If the money supply is stable and half the country gets bombed, you get inflation. Price levels are a function of both money demand and money supply. Ignoring the demand side of the equation doesn…

> This is nonsense. Nope. This is one of the reasons we had insane inflation after Covid: we printed too much. For example, here: https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/042015/how-does-mon...

Nobody said printing money can’t cause inflation. Just that it’s not the only factor at play.

You can have an economy with zero money printing that experiences inflation or deflation.

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not know why anyone would bet that the executive order defined tariffs would stay. It was and still clear as a day that Trump uses them to force people to the negotiation table. Obviously, negotiated deal may look different. Regardless, tariffs as an instrument have their merit with Trump or without Trump. Strategically, US has to bring manufacturing (and as much of a supply chains) back, there is no way around…

> do not know why anyone would bet that the executive order defined tariffs would stay If nobody bets on the tariffs staying then manufacturing doesn’t come back. The restoring of manufacturing is the bet. > US has to bring manufacturing (and as much of a supply chains) back Sure. These tariffs don’t do that.

> Sure. These tariffs don’t do that.

How do you know? Are you from the future?

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> do not know why anyone would bet that the executive order defined tariffs would stay If nobody bets on the tariffs staying then manufacturing doesn’t come back. The restoring of manufacturing is the bet. > US has to bring manufacturing (and as much of a supply chains) back Sure. These tariffs don’t do that.

> Sure. These tariffs don’t do that. How do you know? Are you from the future?

> Are you from the future?

…we are currently in the future of the previous tariffs.

Also, come on, you’re yourself arguing these tariffs aren’t worth betting on. What do you think investing in a factory is?

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I can tell, over the last few years at least, that's mostly not true: wages outpaced inflation, and it outpaced inflation more for lower-income workers than higher. > In stark contrast to prior decades, low-wage workers experienced dramatically fast real wage growth between 2019 and 2023 https://www.epi.org/publication/swa-wages-2023/ ("real wages" are wages adjusted for inflation)

If these reports say that things are better for low income people, why do people living that reality overwhelmingly disagree? Any statistics derived from inflation figures are doomed to be wrong when the inflation data was wrong to begin with. I'm not in the US, but our inflation data was just as wrong as I've heard the US data was. Official numbers were 10% but literally everything went up at least 20%. Everyone I s…

the reports are written by people who are not in the same wage category. that is why they don't reflect the lived experiences of these people.

facts and experiences are two very different things. Despite wages going up, poor people can still experience hardship and the feeling of always missing out / having less. it's a matter of contrast, not numbers. And that contrast, that's formed by lived experiences, not some report numbers or percentages thrown around here n there.

Policies should aim to elevate lived experiences of people, not change some numbers here and there to make the facts more confortable morally -_-.

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is nonsense. Nope. This is one of the reasons we had insane inflation after Covid: we printed too much. For example, here: https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/042015/how-does-mon...

Nobody said printing money can’t cause inflation. Just that it’s not the only factor at play. You can have an economy with zero money printing that experiences inflation or deflation.

> Nobody said printing money can’t cause inflation.

You said in the comment above.

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody said printing money can’t cause inflation. Just that it’s not the only factor at play. You can have an economy with zero money printing that experiences inflation or deflation.

> Nobody said printing money can’t cause inflation. You said in the comment above.

> You said in the comment above

How do you read “price levels are a function of both money demand and money supply” and get that?

Going back to the top, you claimed “riding [sic] salaries do not lead to inflation.” That is nonsense. Even if we ignore that rising salaries cause the money supply to increase through increased velocity, wealth effect and credit creation. (This is why when the economy is strong central banks raise rates to keep price levels stable. You have to destroy money to make up for the money being created by the private sector.)

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still, none of that outweighs the inflationary pressure. Increasing automation and therefore productivity means an increase in profits to the owners, not a drop in prices, except in the most competitive industries. Unemployment is already extremely low. There aren't tons of Americans waiting to step into these jobs. If unemployment were 10% that would be a different story, but we're close to full employment. So inste…

High unemployment would mean companies would have to offer more money to attract people They want unemployment to be low so they can keep wages and salaries suppressed

Except, of course, that this is completely backwards. Low unemployment shifts the balance of negociating power towards workers as companies have to compete to get them. See the massive growth in AI engineers’ wages for a nice illustration of this.

High unemployment helps employers because they can put pressure on the workers, who are less likely to find a job with better conditions or at all.

The fact that low unemployment is associated with stagnating wages these days is a massive failure of the capitalist system. It means that the situation is deteriorating and some of the levers cannot be used. There is no way out without pain.

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sure. These tariffs don’t do that. How do you know? Are you from the future?

> Are you from the future? …we are currently in the future of the previous tariffs. Also, come on, you’re yourself arguing these tariffs aren’t worth betting on. What do you think investing in a factory is?

> …we are currently in the future of the previous tariffs.

Which ones?

> Also, come on, you’re yourself arguing these tariffs aren’t worth betting on. What do you think investing in a factory is?

I can’t bet on negotiation tactic, only on the outcomes and formal agreements. As soon as those would be finalized we would know. Now we do not know how the trade policy would look like. I would assume that investment banker knows the difference.

Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're probably right, but it ultimately leads to wage compression which is for most of the middle class a disaster. You don't have to look far to see everyday people complaining about the price of a burger or movie ticket. IMHO, it doesn't "lift all boats", it pulls down the middle and upper middle classes. Yeah, the lower wage jobs made more money, but they didn't gain much if anything in affordability, since all o…

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Re: Poorest US workers hit hardest by slowing wage growth

#190

That's the myth of Trickle-down economics in action.

The same thing happens in other countries too BTW. Prime example is Japan, where prime minister Abe promoted this nice lie for many long years

Curiously in the Netherlands poverty has gone down. But that's because the government has a pretty solid Robin Hood system going on: take from the rich give to the poor.

The amount of wealth that is redistributed is frankly insane.

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