Your Incredible Shrinking Paycheck

An interesting article from Time Magazine that I was reading today online, regarding the increasing trend of lesser paying jobs during the economic recovery. And how perhaps this trend will continue even if things stabilize in the future.

Before I started writing this column on why paychecks are likely to keep shrinking even if unemployment starts to inch down, I consulted Google to see if the term Marxism was trending upward. It was and has been ever since the end of December, the conclusion of a year in which workers' share of the U.S. economic pie shrank to the smallest piece ever: 54.4% of GDP, down from about 60% in the 1970s.

No wonder Marx is back in fashion. It's been more than 100 years since the German philosopher predicted that capitalism's voraciousness would be its undoing — as bosses invest more in new technologies to make things more cheaply and efficiently and less in workers themselves, who, deprived of fair wages, would eventually rise up and revolt. That hasn't happened, of course, though depressed wages certainly contributed to the revolution in Egypt, not to mention lots of other instances of public unrest over the past few years. But the fact that wages in the U.S. and most other rich countries have been falling since the 1970s and went off a cliff after the recent financial crisis is going to become a more pressing economic and political concern. Just think how hard it will be for Obama to sell himself in 2012 if salaries are still falling.

And fall they have, to an extent not seen since the 1930s. Labor Department figures show that from 2007 to 2009, more than half the full-time workers who lost jobs and then found new work took pay cuts. A depressing 36% had to take positions paying 20% less than the ones they lost.

The rest of the article can be read here.

So what are your thoughts ATS? Do you think that now the new “jobs” surged promised by your elected officials will all be what I call “McJobs” that pay less than what is required to live? Or is this just temporary until things pickup?

Thoughts and comments appreciated.

~Keeper

Shrinking paycheck ehh?
Sounds like some folks need a union.
I'm with McDonalds local #3
It is getting to the point where it is better to take the risk and employ yourself anymore.
Now how to get past all of the state imposed corporate backed taxes on my business.
Damned if you do and dead if you don't.
Quite the pickle ehh?

Unfortunately, I must agree. Unless things change drastically the future will likely be as you say. If we refuse to act and restore sanity to our government and balance to our economy then the future is truly bleak indeed.

reply to post by tothetenthpower


Lol Your thread title made me laugh tenth! A literal physical shrinking check!

But in all serious I think we all know what this is about. Class division. More divide and conquer. More trying to dig out of a hole that is pretty much impossible to dig out of anyhow (and it's all just an illusion anyway, except for the people's pain and turmoil).

Of course I am speaking for an American POV. I can't believe your countries debt has now exceeded your GDP. Capitalism has failed and so will Corporatism.

SnF

AS

Reply to post by AeonStorm

Canada has had better luck with such things. We've largely escaped the recession although it still shows up in finance due to our close trading ties with the US.

Maybe the US will become the new India lol

~Keeper


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

there are already jobs in the UK you can't afford to live on, there called apprenticeships.

Company hires you for six months at a hird of minimum wage and gives you qualifications that are negligable in value then once your 6 months are up instead of taking you on at minimum wage they let you go and hire the next round of apprentices.

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
Reply to post by AeonStorm

 

Maybe the US will become the new India lol

~Keeper

 

Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

 

we would need a functioning education system for that to happen.

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
Reply to post by AeonStorm

 

Canada has had better luck with such things. We've largely escaped the recession although it still shows up in finance due to our close trading ties with the US.

Maybe the US will become the new India lol

~Keeper

 

Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

 

Yeah we've gotten off pretty lucky so far but Harper and his cronies keep trying to intertwine our economies more and more! It goes angainst logic IMO! It drags us down without a doubt.

Oh, man PLEASE don't say that! LOL! No Offense to India but I really don't want an India just to the south of me!

AS

WELCOME to the NEW WORLD people! .... HA *sigh* ... It's all very tiresome.

Personally, I am in the rather unique position to be in a corner of the industry that has been doing just fine. However…and this is a BIG however…

What I have been seeing is that the various different companies, even though they are doing just fine and in some instances making record profits, is that they are using the economic downturn as an excuse to cut salaries and cut benefits. These companies seem to know that every one of their employees knows someone, either family or friend, who has lost their job and taken a McJob or who has been on unemployment for months on end. So, it seems to have made them rather bold in "cutting back," even when those cuts have not been necessary for the viability of the company. From my point of view, all it's really doing is making their already high profits that much higher…all at the expense of the people who work for them (except the CEOs of course).

And yes, I think that it is going to continue. Or at least I haven't seen any signs of it turning around yet, so unfortunately, I think the incredibly shinking paychecks are here to stay.

paychecks get smaller while prices get bigger.

I can't help but wonder how long i will be until someone snaps

IT only takes one person to take the right action at the right time to change the fate of a country

en.wikipedia.org...

Originally posted by monkofmimir
paychecks get smaller while prices get bigger.

I can't help but wonder how long i will be until someone snaps

IT only takes one person to take the right action at the right time to change the fate of a country

en.wikipedia.org...

People are already snapping ... Not necessarily taking the right action .... but desperate ones. Take a look at this bit from near my Hometown:

A gunman who held eight hostages at the Workers' Compensation Board building in downtown Edmonton surrendered peacefully around 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, police said.

During the standoff, a man claiming to be the hostage taker called the CBC Edmonton newsroom to complain about the treatment he received from the WCB. He said he was injured on the job, the WCB had unfairly cut him off his benefits and that he has been unable to work since.

"I've got tax forms here saying that I've lived on $5,000 a year. They cut me off for two years. I went to social services. I was trying to do career development with them because WCB would not retrain me. All they did was give me a f--king floppy disk, type out my resumé and run around the countryside trying to get employment."

This story was from last year.

AS

Yes..........I was making $30,000+ 2.5 years ago and now bring in just $13,000. I went from being able to, pretty much, buy what I wanted to barely paying the bills and food each month! But, we are doing okay.....better than alot of people. My concern is the rising gas & food costs. I really believe the worst is yet to come, unfortunately.

corporate america= slave new world to us all

Originally posted by zooplancton

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
Reply to post by AeonStorm

 

Maybe the US will become the new India lol

~Keeper

 

Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

 

we would need a functioning education system for that to happen.

The first steps for that would be getting rid of the dept of education(what a boondoggle), then get rid of teachers unions(so incompetent or lazy teachers can be fired), then allow parents to choose their child's school with their tax dollars "following the child".

The decline in the Western standard of living is due to the global economy seeking equilibrium, and that equilibrium is reached when comparable wages/prices in China and India equal Western wages/prices. As trade barriers wind down and the markets become more globalized, these inequalities between labor and prices will lessen.

....lowest average annual income of the 183 countries and regions in the world is approximately US$6,078, while China’s is only US$896.

source


Is Low-Wage China Disappearing?

Speculators suggest Chinese and Indian wages are less likely to rise as fast as Western wages will fall.

Originally posted by sapient
What I have been seeing is that the various different companies, even though they are doing just fine and in some instances making record profits, is that they are using the economic downturn as an excuse to cut salaries and cut benefits. .... From my point of view, all it's really doing is making their already high profits that much higher…all at the expense of the people who work for them (except the CEOs of course).

And yes, I think that it is going to continue. Or at least I haven't seen any signs of it turning around yet, so unfortunately, I think the incredibly shinking paychecks are here to stay.

Agree.

The economic downturns in the 1980s were cushioned/subsidized by the growth of the illegal drug economy. Plus there was still a middle class cushion of wealth. And the labor supply had yet to see the great rise in illegal workers to drive wages down. However, union busting started in earnest.

Since then the wealth of the middle class was raided, jobs went elsewhere and were replaced by lower wage service sector jobs, and illegal labor was allowed to flood the labor market, to keep wages in check. Corporate influence in govt skyrocketed, and govt corruption was institutionalized.

With globalization, no national policy came forth to guide this nation to allow all Americans to benefit in American capitalism. The horrible joke being played on Americans now sounds like this, if only American schools were better...hahaha....where would be the jobs for all these graduates?

Also, during all this, much work was being done with newer technology, allowing for decrease in labor. And that is still continuing.

My advice for young people...get used to the idea of working in Asia, or wherever your company sends you. Seriously. The future of America is not here anymore; it's worldwide.

Neither stopping school sponsored prayer, taking down the creche or 10 Commandments, nor Communists, nor gays, nor abortion has led to this, Even Bin Laden couldn't do what American corporate and political greed has done. And it ain't gonna be lower taxes or the Constitution that will help.

Maybe someday Americans will wise up, and rise up, not against each other but with each other. Quit talking about the end of the world and talk about the end of govt corruption by corporate influence. ....oh, and, yeah, enough about Charlie Sheen. That's NOT news.

Dont think wages will rise.. The trend seems to be toward automating everything rather than to creating jobs that people do.. Just wonder what will happen when everything is automated and nobody has a job..