By Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
This is the second part of our 10 part Fall 2016 wage series. In this article we take a look at recent contract settlements and examine how those trends vary from recent previous years. Our view of 2015 and 2016 settlements and what we have so far from 2017 indicates that the Washington State public sector wages are a mirror of national wage stagnation. We see some wage increases with little substantial “real wage” growth (as measured once controlled for inflation). Whether a growing economy eventually will accelerate these is something we’ll discuss later in this series.
