Lower-wage workers outlook brightened as soon as Obama's term was over, and then accelerated when Hillary lost.
Actually, it may be a bit more gradual then that. Lower-wage workers chances increased in 2010 when the GOP took the house, then got a bit better in 2014 when they took the senate..........
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/...-Why-outlook-brightens-for-lower-wage-workers
Wages are rising because a booming economy has created a shortage of workers, forcing companies to pay more to fill jobs. On Friday, the Commerce Department reported the biggest one-month surge in employment in a year and half – 313,000 jobs in February – with hourly earnings up 2.6 percent over the past year.
The effect is especially noticeable for Americans at the bottom end of the pay scale. It’s not just rising wages. Some 806,000 people entered the workforce last month – the biggest monthly rise in 15 years – while the unemployment rate stayed at 4.1 percent, a 17-year low. That means that many sidelined Americans, who had given up on finding jobs, are now finding employment, boosting their income.
And that surge in jobs and pay has pushed the United States into one of those rare periods where the growth in the income gap between rich and poor Americans has slowed – or perhaps stopped altogether.
“That's what happens when the economy recovers,” says Diane Lim, principal economist at The Conference Board, a business membership and research group based in New York. “You see some collapsing of the inequality because the bottom comes up.”
Such periods typically don’t last long enough to reverse the long-term widening of the income gap. And they typically come at the top of an economic cycle, so that just as poor people are gaining jobs and earning more, a recession comes along and knocks them out of the workforce again.
But there are signs that this time, as in the mid-1990s, the poor may be able to continue to make outsize gains for a few more years before a recession hits. That would be a meaningful boost, and it would give policymakers and nonprofits more time to figure out ways to create more stable employment for those at the bottom of the income ladder.
Actually, it may be a bit more gradual then that. Lower-wage workers chances increased in 2010 when the GOP took the house, then got a bit better in 2014 when they took the senate..........
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/...-Why-outlook-brightens-for-lower-wage-workers
Wages are rising because a booming economy has created a shortage of workers, forcing companies to pay more to fill jobs. On Friday, the Commerce Department reported the biggest one-month surge in employment in a year and half – 313,000 jobs in February – with hourly earnings up 2.6 percent over the past year.
The effect is especially noticeable for Americans at the bottom end of the pay scale. It’s not just rising wages. Some 806,000 people entered the workforce last month – the biggest monthly rise in 15 years – while the unemployment rate stayed at 4.1 percent, a 17-year low. That means that many sidelined Americans, who had given up on finding jobs, are now finding employment, boosting their income.
And that surge in jobs and pay has pushed the United States into one of those rare periods where the growth in the income gap between rich and poor Americans has slowed – or perhaps stopped altogether.
“That's what happens when the economy recovers,” says Diane Lim, principal economist at The Conference Board, a business membership and research group based in New York. “You see some collapsing of the inequality because the bottom comes up.”
Such periods typically don’t last long enough to reverse the long-term widening of the income gap. And they typically come at the top of an economic cycle, so that just as poor people are gaining jobs and earning more, a recession comes along and knocks them out of the workforce again.
But there are signs that this time, as in the mid-1990s, the poor may be able to continue to make outsize gains for a few more years before a recession hits. That would be a meaningful boost, and it would give policymakers and nonprofits more time to figure out ways to create more stable employment for those at the bottom of the income ladder.
