U.S. Economic Recovery Is Weakest Since World War II

U.S. Economic Recovery Is Weakest Since World War II

And here is part of the problem:

"Usually, workers' pay rises as the economy picks up momentum after a recession. Not this time. Employers don't have to be generous in a weak job market because most workers don't have anywhere to go.

As a result, pay raises haven't kept up with even modest levels of inflation. Earnings for production and nonsupervisory workers – a category that covers about 80 percent of the private, nonfarm workforce – have risen just over 6.2 percent since June 2009. Consumer prices have risen nearly 7.2 percent. Adjusted for inflation, wages have fallen 0.8 percent. In the previous five recoveries _the records go back only to 1964 – real wages had gone up an average 1.5 percent at this point.

Falling wages haven't hurt everyone. Lower labor costs helped push corporate profits to a record 10.6 percent of U.S. GDP in the first three months of 2012, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. And those surging profits helped lift the Dow Jones industrials 54 percent from the end of June 2009 to the end of last month."

Wages have not kept pace with productivity, and as a result, wealth has accumulated at the top, and not stimulated consumer demand...

CLASS WAR