Americans haven’t gotten a raise in 16 years

[BobStackFan4Life]

Americans are angry because they don’t care about the statistical noise — they care about what they see with their own eyes.

True, there may have been 15 million new jobs created during the Obama administration — which, on the surface, is laudable. But that’s about half what was needed to both absorb newcomers to the workforce and those who were laid off over the past decade and would like to return.

And that drop in the unemployment rate that everyone likes to point to? Even the Fed doesn’t trust it and has formulated its own replacement gauge.

Here’s why: When you count all the workers who have been stuck with part-time employment or who haven’t searched for work in a year, the jobless rate is twice the official 5% level. And many of the full-time jobs created have been in the lower-paying service sector of the economy.

When you include those people who haven’t sought a job in more than a year, the unemployment rate jumps much higher.

How high? Washington doesn’t even bother trying to calculate what it is.

One last statistic, from Sentier Research. Median annual household income in the US reached $57,263 this past March, which was 4.5% higher than in March 2015.

But — and here’s where the anger comes in — this March’s figure is still slightly below the $57,342 median annual income in January 2000.

http://nypost.com/2016/04/30/americans-havent-gotten-a-raise-in-16-years/

 

[EatLeadCommie]

I never understood why we didn't put a pinch on legal immigration (particularly employment-based) starting in 2009, but you could argue that back to the end of 2001, I suppose. We kept H1Bs and immigrant visa numbers the same or increased them.

 

[PhDeac]

Damn immigrants aren't giving Americans raises.

 

[ThinkingWithMyDeac]

The scientific workforce pay is extremely depressed by H1B visas, one of the top reasons for a completely broken system. Always figured it would be a good fight for conservatives to take up because it would help them in their we don't care about science image while at the same time champion smaller government spending and American workers.

 

[sailordeac]

some of you need to spend more time working and less time on the boards

 

[BobStackFan4Life]

Damn immigrants aren't giving Americans raises.

You sarcastically say this, yet you also seem to recognize that a large surplus of workers weakens the bargaining power of native born workers. While immigrants are typically not the ones refusing to give raises, their presence makes it difficult for native born workers to get raises.

 

[EatLeadCommie]

Damn immigrants aren't giving Americans raises.

Not what I said at all. It is, or had been, pretty natural to put a pinch on (legal) immigration in rough economic times. We saw just the opposite. I mean, there were fewer issued due to fact that there weren't jobs, but there was no official pinch. H1Bs in particular should've been clipped to what they were in the mid 90s (before they got out of control) at the very least.

 

[myDeaconmyhand]

Talk about speaking out of both sides of your mouth. On one side, it's that Americans are poor lazy welfare moochers, and illegal immigrants are just taking the manual labor jobs that we're too lazy for. On the other side, illegal immigrants are taking all of the good white collar and manufacturing jobs that real Americans had before the recession. I guess it's no fucking coincidence that neither of those scenarios address the corporate greed, driven by stockholders, that's reducing workforces, increasing automation, paying low wages, and moving production out of the country.

Conservatives worship supply side economics, but they get alligator arms when the check comes due. Unemployment high? Must be those lazy poors or illegal immigrants.

 

[BobStackFan4Life]

Talk about speaking out of both sides of your mouth. On one side, it's that Americans are poor lazy welfare moochers, and illegal immigrants are just taking the manual labor jobs that we're too lazy for.

This is essentially the "Immigrants do jobs Americans won't do" argument. It's not true.
http://cis.org/are-there-really-jobs-americans-wont-do

On the other side, illegal immigrants are taking all of the good white collar and manufacturing jobs that real Americans had before the recession.

I've heard no one say this. A large number of immigrants do work in manufacturing though. That's just a fact. As is the large number of immigrants employed by the tech industry. In Silicon Valley, 75% of tech, computer, and STEM jobs are going to foreign born workers.

Among the working population, 45 percent are foreign born, but in the tech, computer and STEM industries, that number rises to 75 percent, according to the Index.

http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2016/02/10/silicon-valleys-year-amazing-but-with-perils
For every 2 students that graduate with a STEM degree, only 1 is hired into a STEM job. Some of that is because many choose to go into other fields. But much of it is due to the reliance on foreign born workers.

I guess it's no fucking coincidence that neither of those scenarios address the corporate greed, driven by stockholders, that's reducing workforces, increasing automation, paying low wages, and moving production out of the country.

The people running companies want to make as much money as possible and are always looking for ways to cut costs. If they can automate a job they will. If they can pay an employee less they will. There is a lot going into what's been negatively impacting American workers- immigration is just part of it. But it is a significant part of it. And not surprisingly the people who have been most negatively impacted tend to be less well off Americans. When you flood the market with a large surplus of labor competing for the same job, there is little incentive for employers to improve conditions.

 

[wakephan09]

For every 2 students that graduate with a STEM degree, only 1 is hired into a STEM job.

Sounds like our youth should pursue degrees in the humanities instead.

 

[myDeaconmyhand]

You are lumping illegal and illegal immigration together, when strictly illegal immigration is the focus of the national conversation. I'd like to see the numbers on the flood of illegal immigrants in white collar/higher wage manufacturing jobs because I don't believe that illegals are actually competing for those positions. I'm fairly confident that illegal immigrants are mostly limited to small business retail/service and contracted construction/manual labor - relatively low paying jobs.

Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

 

[PhDeac]

A lot of those foreign STEM workers graduated from US universities. Bob, got a link for that 1 of 2 star?

 

[BobStackFan4Life]

A lot of those foreign STEM workers graduated from US universities. Bob, got a link for that 1 of 2 star?

For every two students that U.S. colleges graduate with STEM degrees, only one is hired into a STEM job.
In computer and information science and in engineering, U.S. colleges graduate 50 percent more students than are hired into those fields each year; of the computer science graduates not entering the IT workforce, 32 percent say it is because IT jobs are unavailable, and 53 percent say they found better job opportunities outside of IT occupations. These responses suggest that the supply of graduates is substantially larger than the demand for them in industry.

http://www.epi.org/publication/bp359-guestworkers-high-skill-labor-market-analysis/