Free Republic

The declines were greatest for the lowest-paid workers in sectors where hiring has been strong — home health care, food preparation and retailing — even though wages were already below average to begin with in those service industries. “Stagnant wages are a problem for everyone at this point, but the imbalance in the economy has become more pronounced since the recession,” said Irene Tung, a senior policy researcher at the National Employment Law Project and co-author of the study. Jasmin Almodovar, a home health care aide in Cleveland, knows all about that. She has worked for the same health care...

A Democratic stalwart warns that labor's old strategy can't win against a new competitive reality. Many of my friends will consider this view heretical. But it is based on stark reality... It can be galling to hear companies argue that they have to cut wages and benefits for hourly workers — even as they reward top executives with millions of dollars in stock options. The chief executive of Wal-Mart earns $27 million a year, while the company's average worker takes home only about $10 an hour. But let's assume that the chief executive got 27 cents instead of $27 million,...

Do you remember those Information Technology (IT) jobs that were going to take the place in the "new economy" of those outsourced manufacturing jobs? Don't bother to retrain. The IT jobs are leaving, too. Knowledge work can be done anywhere there are educated people. These days, that's just about everywhere: the Philippines, India, China, Russia, Eastern Europe, Costa Rica and South Africa. Outsourcing of "new economy" jobs is exploding. A recent article in the Feb. 3 Business Week describes "dazzling new technology parks" on the outskirts of India's major cities, where U.S. companies such as Bank of America, Texas Instruments,...