Why Wages Just Aren't Keeping Up

One of the more puzzling and damaging features of the American labor market in the last few decades has been the failure of real (i.e. inflation-adjusted) wages and benefits to keep up with the increase in productivity. In the years after the Second World War, real wages generally rose at the same rate as output per hour worked. This rough balance was made explicit in what came to be called the Treaty of Detroit: the agreement between the United Auto Workers and General Motors (followed by Ford and Chrysler) that the average annual rate of wage increase would be the percentage increase in productivity plus the percentage increase in consumer prices. This norm spread beyond the auto industry. It had the arithmetic consequence that the share of total value added in industry going to labor would stay roughly constant, with the rest going to the capital side.