The main reason for wage suppression is more tied to the country wanting to intentionally devalue its own currency through inflation because of recessions (or f

The main reason for wage suppression is more tied to the country wanting to intentionally devalue its own currency through inflation because of recessions (or fear of recession). Devaluing the currency and wage suppression are done in order to make exports more profitable for companies so they can start growing again (or prevent them from going bankrupt during a recession) and to later reinvest to trigger economic growth again. At the same time also to reduce the number of imports due to them being more expensive due to inflation. It is all about rebalancing the trade deficit. Wage suppression is a well known way to get economies out of a recession, it is not necessarily a way to fight inflation (the inflation, to some extent, is desired in order to devalue your own currency). After the recession is over there is usually a period of market imbalance where new hires get inflation-adjusted salaries and tenured employees either eat the loss or are forced to move jobs to get competitive salaries again. But yeah, it is the peons (wage-earners) who get screwed at the end, asset-owners (people who own stocks, property or companies) mostly get to ride it out unscathed.