On Politics: Rise of the Senior Class, Wage Stagnation Fake News

•  In less than a decade, the U.S. population under 30 will be majority non-white. (Source:  University of Minnesota research)

From Phil:  I saw this in spades during a recent trip to NYC … we were clearly a minority wherever we went, except expensive restaurants, where we were barely a majority, and the service crew was definitely non-white.

•  Regarding the mammoth Generation X and Millennial generations that will be voting in 2020, the rising tide, more progressive in their values and more Democratic in their voting habits.  Not completely true, notes a WSJ column.  The old are the future.  The largest increases in voting by age groups in the past few elections have come from those over 65.  In 2016, the number of voters over 65 out-numbered those between 18-34 for the first time ever.  In 2020, it will be by an even greater amount.   And they still vote in larger percentages than do the younger voters.

•  More Fake News:  The Myth of Wage Stagnation

In a WSJ article, a former U.S. Senator and a former BLS honcho said that the contention that wages have stagnated misrepresents the full truth.  Yes, BLS data show that production/nonsupervisory employee average hourly earnings peaked in October 1972 are were at the same inflation-adjusted level in March 2019.  But … the authors contend the effective buying power of the March wages is at least 70% higher.  It certainly feels like that.  5% of the difference is due to additional worker benefits, which comprise 30% of wages and aren’t counted in the earnings calculation.  Most of the rest is due to the higher efficiency and quality of what is bought at the same price.  There have been major increases in productivity value in air travel and the market basket of goods, an additional 27%.  Then there’s the greater value of new products like the smart phones and other smart technological gadgets, or of better medical devices and drugs, or of better houses, or cars, or ....  There are additional factors, too, that get warped by different methods of calculating price increases relative to value.  In essence, they say, what we get for the average wage today is vastly greater than what we got for a comparable wage back in 1972.