U.S. Wage Trends
The microeconomic picture of the U.S. has changed immensely since 1973, and the
trends are proving to be consistently downward for the nation's high school
graduates and high school drop-outs. "Of all the reasons given for the wage
squeeze ? international competition, technology, deregulation, the decline of
unions and defense cuts ? technology is probably the most critical. It has
favored the educated and the skilled," says M. B. Zuckerman, editor-in-chief of
U.S. News & World Report (7/31/95). Since 1973, wages adjusted for inflation
have declined by about a quarter for high school dropouts, by a sixth for high
school graduates, and by about 7% for those with some college education. Only
the wages of college graduates are up.
Of the fastest growing technical jobs, software engineering tops the list.
Carnegie Mellon University reports, "recruitment of it's software engineering
students is up this year by over 20%." All engineering jobs are paying well,
proving that highly skilled labor is what employers want! "There is clear
evidence that the supply of workers in the [unskilled labor] categories already
exceeds the demand for their services," says L. Mishel, Research Director of
Welfare Reform Network.
In view of these facts, I wonder if these trends are good or bad for society. "
The danger of the information age is that while in the short run it may be
cheaper to replace workers with technology, in the long run it is potentially
self-destructive because there will not be enough purchasing power to grow the
economy," M. B. Zuckerman. My feeling is that the trend from unskilled labor to
highly technical, skilled labor is ...