The unjust stagnation of worker pay has been confirmed by a new study released in August by the Economic Policy Institute. The Institute found that, while worker productivity has risen by almost 20 percent since the year 2000, the real median hourly wage has risen only 3 percent. In other words, while the Republicans have controlled the government, American workers have been working more efficiently for their bosses, but have been unjustly deprived of compensation for creating extra wealth for their employers.
The right wing government set up by the Republicans does not have control of all of the factors that lead to this growing economic injustice in America, but the right wing government does contribute to it, through policies that encourage concentration of wealth in the hands of top investors at the expense of working Americans.
It doesn’t have to be this way. In the second half of the 1990s, America saw a distribution of wealth that, while still not truly just, was more equitable than what we see now.
In 2008, America has a choice, to embrace the cheating of the American worker, or to give working Americans a fair deal, and elect a President who will push for government policies that encourage employment relationships where workers are justly compensated for the wealth that they create.
(Source: Economic Policy Institute, September 3, 2007)
