If you think employers save money by paying people less than they did 20 years ago it should get reflected in huge profit margins. If you think so go ahead open some kind of manufacturing business and get rich. Actually, you being a nice guy, would pay your employees above market value of labor. Who cares about competition when you get a chance to help people.
The fact is that these illegals are even more economical than machines at the moment. But don't worry. This is just a transitory situation. Computers/technology costs decrease exponentially. Illegals costs rise on par with the overall inflation. The two have to meet at some point.
At certain point of time employers decided to pay employees less then they used to. That's how it happened, suddenly and without any reason.
Good point. The problem is that many people keep clinging to the past while we are living times of accelerating change. Its not even a matter of good or bad (although in my view, this is the most exciting time in history). You have to adapt in order to survive. It's as simple as that. What's today is nothing compared with the speed of the changes that will soon come. Booms and busts will be more frequent and more powerfull than before. It will be brutal. But I am prepared. Let's hope we won't destroy ourselves in the process (a small, but still a significant possibility).
If you noticed S&P had double digit profit growth during the last several years. And median wages decreased. So definetely margins increased because people are paid less than before
Ad hominem agruments do not stregthen your position. His 'methodology' as you put it is to undo the changes made to the CPI calculation after 1982. That's when they started massaging the numbers to report smaller inflation numbers. All sgs does is take the BLS raw data and apply the pre-1982 formula. 1. It more accurately represents what consumers are actually paying. 2. When you compare sgs' current inflation/cpi numbers to BLS's 1975 numbers, you are comparing apples to apples. When you compare BLS's current inflation/cpi numbers to BLS's 1975 numbers, you are comparing apples to oranges. That's accounted for in the cpi That's nonsense. The CPI is the Consumer Price Index. It is supposed to reflect the prices that consumers actually pay for goods and services not some crap spit out by spin doctors. Ad hominem arguments do not enhance your position.
interesting to take a look at this thread that ended in nov, 2007, and see who may have been right. anybody change their mind?