By Jim Cline
One additional sign of good economic news this week came in the form of a Bureau of Labor Statistics Second Quarter Wage Report. The BLS, the data reporting branch of the Department of Labor reports that despite the low rate of inflation, reports wages are rising, 2.7% as to the period one year ago:
Median weekly earnings of the nation’s 108.8 million full-time wage and salary workers were $801 in the second quarter of 2015 (not seasonally adjusted), the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. This was 2.7 percent higher than a year earlier, compared with no change in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) over the same period.
These rising wages, especially since they are excess of current inflation, are a indicator that the falling unemployment rate is causing a tightening of the labor market and increasing pressure of wages in the general labor market. For unions negotiating labor contracts, these trends are not controlling as to the outcome in particular industries or regions, but they certainly add some additional bit of bargaining leverage.
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