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The article notes that a greater percentage of national income is going to workers now, which may very well be true according to how the accounting is done. How

by grej 10y ago

The article notes that a greater percentage of national income is going to workers now, which may very well be true according to how the accounting is done. However, how much of that is because many large corporations are booking a great deal of their profits outside of the US, reducing the denominator in kind of an artificial way? I didn't see anything in the article that mentioned the potential effects of corporations booking profits to overseas cost centers. The chart the NYT shows depicts worker compensation percentage of national income. I'd be interested to see what overall worker compensation and overall corporate profits look like in inflation-adjusted terms, separately.

crpatino 10y ago
Another possibility is to look at the compensation for upper management. C-level officers are usually paid in stock as well as cash, but the staff reporting directly to them are salaried employees. If you actually look at the graph (presented in the same article) it does not look like "the trend is reversing" at all. It rather looks like a very clear downwards trend with a strong cyclic component. So, when the times are good, the salaried bosses might just be handing out productivity bonuses to their reports, and passing the bill to the shareholders.
- maxerickson 10y ago
  Broad measures of wages are also showing growth.
- jackcosgrove 10y ago
  Exactly, take away the cyclical component of the wage graph and it's still trending down.
- No1 10y ago
  > C-level officers are usually paid in stock as well as cash, but the staff reporting directly to them are salaried employees. A great point, but note that the writer considers C-level officers to be workers in this case. The headline might as well be Workers Pay Probably Keeping up with Inflation, Execs Doing Great, but that's not really news.
- heimatau 10y ago
  Very very true. I'm doing research on this. Chart 3 demonstrates this clearly. Non-management workers are receiving less compensation. http://0-search.ebscohost.com.skyline.ucdenver.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=85698541 http://0-search.ebscohost.com.skyline.ucdenver.edu/login.asp... - Note, sorry it's behind a pay wall. Alt cite: MAGDOFF, F., & FOSTER, J. B. (2013). Class War and Labor's Declining Share. Monthly Review: An Independent Socialist Magazine, 64(10), 1. EDIT: Was able to find a public link, through Google Scholar: http://search.proquest.com/openview/4be2b770b6d137e018c146e52bba4a45/1?pq-origsite=gscholar http://search.proquest.com/openview/4be2b770b6d137e018c146e5...

by grej 10y ago

crpatino 10y ago

Another possibility is to look at the compensation for upper management. C-level officers are usually paid in stock as well as cash, but the staff reporting directly to them are salaried employees. If you actually look at the graph (presented in the same article) it does not look like "the trend is reversing" at all. It rather looks like a very clear downwards trend with a strong cyclic component. So, when the times are good, the salaried bosses might just be handing out productivity bonuses to their reports, and passing the bill to the shareholders.

maxerickson 10y ago
Broad measures of wages are also showing growth.
jackcosgrove 10y ago
Exactly, take away the cyclical component of the wage graph and it's still trending down.
No1 10y ago
> C-level officers are usually paid in stock as well as cash, but the staff reporting directly to them are salaried employees. A great point, but note that the writer considers C-level officers to be workers in this case. The headline might as well be Workers Pay Probably Keeping up with Inflation, Execs Doing Great, but that's not really news.
heimatau 10y ago
Very very true. I'm doing research on this. Chart 3 demonstrates this clearly. Non-management workers are receiving less compensation. http://0-search.ebscohost.com.skyline.ucdenver.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=85698541 http://0-search.ebscohost.com.skyline.ucdenver.edu/login.asp... - Note, sorry it's behind a pay wall. Alt cite: MAGDOFF, F., & FOSTER, J. B. (2013). Class War and Labor's Declining Share. Monthly Review: An Independent Socialist Magazine, 64(10), 1. EDIT: Was able to find a public link, through Google Scholar: http://search.proquest.com/openview/4be2b770b6d137e018c146e52bba4a45/1?pq-origsite=gscholar http://search.proquest.com/openview/4be2b770b6d137e018c146e5...