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How are we accommodating growth of the economy in this argument? Or even growth in a particular industry with a high demand for labor?

• sonnyblarney 8y ago
  That's 'long run' economics. So yes, as soon as you get outside the short run it gets hard to calculate. But it's really hard to argue in any circumstance that 'more workers = higher wages' because wages will be a function of available labour. The 'rub' in the data really is the fact it doesn't take into consideration the black market. Wages paid under the table are 100% part of the real economy, and those are wages, but they generally don't go into the equations. Imagine if the 'average us wage' were calculated with a few million extra people earning below minimum and with zero benefits? When there is full employment though, and not tons of undocumented workers, one could argue that economic expansion could pick up the slack, surely.