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The monkey image is a great analogy for what economists are currently studying as the "productivity puzzle". Low to zero productivity growth is also why our un
by roymurdock 10y ago
The monkey image is a great analogy for what economists are currently studying as the "productivity puzzle".
Low to zero productivity growth is also why our unemployment rate in the US is amazingly low (seemingly a tight labor market), but why real median income is stagnant.
- TheAdamAndChe 10y agoAlso keep in mind that the unemployment rate is highly skewed. It doesn't factor in people who have dropped out of the workforce or consider minimum wage or nearly minimum wage workers. If unemployment was truly as low as it says, then wages would be going up due to a higher demand for workers. This wage increase is not being seen.
- eli_gottlieb 10y agoActually, there have been some wage increases on the bottom end over the last few years, driven by legislative pushes and worker shortages.
- astrange 10y agoThis seems like a form of the HN "middle-brow dismissal" where you claim an expert is wrong because they didn't explicitly rebut the first thing you happened to think of. Those people are called "discouraged workers" and are tracked. One reason wages don't go up is that the value of employer benefits goes up every year because of the incredible cost of providing health insurance.