More than once it has been asserted in this list that the living
standards of the working class in the USA and the UK suffered a
deep fall since the early 70's. Yet, this is not what the available
statistics on real wages (that is to say, the nominal wages divided
by the cost of living index, or the wages in terms of use values)
seem to reflect.
In the case of the USA, there is a fall of less than 10% from the
70’s to the 90’s, of which 6% corresponds to the fall from the 80's
to the 90's. But the wage level in the latter equals that of the
supposedly unbeaten 60’s.
In the case of the UK, far from falling, along the 90’s the real wages
have been 54% above the 60’s, 26% above the 70’s and 17% above
the 80's (perhaps the UK rises include some extension of the
working day, since the data are computed on a monthly basis, but
that eventuality is far from being able to account for the magnitude
of the increase).
To emphasize the contrast between the evolution of real wages in
the UK and in the USA against what happened in countries where
the accumulation of capital takes a different specific shape, I
include the data for Argentina. Here, the real industrial wages
ceased to rise in the first half of the 70’s, and have fallen in the 90’s
28% from the 60’s, 26% from the average 70’s, and 20% from the
80's (and the monthly industrial registered wages certainly include
an extension of the working day, and are not the ones that have
suffered the greatest fall).
Sources of nominal wages and CPI:
(1) USA: average hourly earnings of production workers in
manufacturing, BLS
(2) UK: average monthly wages, IMF
(3) Argentina: average monthly wages in manufacturing, INDEC
Real wages data (1960/64=100):
USA UK Arg.
60-64 100 100 100
65-69 107 113 118
70-74 113 135 122
75-79 117 137 90
80-84 112 137 96
85-89 110 157 99
90-95 104 166 79
95-99 104 178 77
The relative evolutions do not change in a substantial way if the real
wages of employed workers are weighted by considering the rate of
unemployment:
USA UK Arg.
60-64 100 100 100
65-69 109 113 121
70-74 114 134 124
75-79 116 135 94
80-84 109 129 99
85-89 110 146 100
90-95 103 155 79
95-99 105 171 72
Could the data for the USA and the UK be somehow mistaken or
misleading? Could it be that the supposed profound fall in the USA
and UK real wages, and consequently in the living standards of the
working class in these countries, did not take place (and in the
latter case, that an important increase occurred)? I look forward to
the comments of the members of the list that are closer than me to
these national economies.
Juan Inigo
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.clacso.edu.ar/~jinigo
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