Inflation-adjusted Wages Slipping in Second Quarter

According to a recent report, median weekly earnings of the nation's 115.8 million full-time wage and salary workers were $876 in the second quarter of 2018 (not seasonally adjusted), the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.

This was 2.0 percent higher than a year earlier, compared with a gain of 2.7 percent in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) over the same period. Thus, the increase in wages did not keep up with inflation, leading to a net reduction of approximately .7% in wages for the second quarter.