Inflation hits 6-year high, wiping out wage gains for the average American
Prices rose at their highest clip since 2012 over the past year, the Labor Department reported Thursday. The 2.9 percent inflation for the 12-month period ending in June is a sign of a growing economy, but it’s also a painful development for workers, whose tepid wage gains have failed to keep pace with the rising prices.
Donald Trump promised American workers that his massive tax giveaway to the rich and large corporations would likely give the typical American household a $4,000 pay raise. He was lying. According to a recent report, since Trump signed his tax plan into law, wage growth for full-time private sector workers has gone down, not up, by 0.9 percent. Over this time period, manufacturing workers experienced the biggest reduction in wages down 5 percent, followed by a 4.7 percent reduction in pay for construction workers, 3.4 percent for restaurant workers and 0.7 percent for retail workers.
The Trump tax plan was never meant to help the middle class. It was always designed to reward billionaire campaign contributors. Our job: Repeal the Trump tax breaks for the rich and powerful and use this revenue to rebuild the disappearing middle class.
The Trump tax cuts still aren’t helping regular folks
Seven months after they went into effect, the Trump tax cuts are sharply boosting corporate earnings. Ordinary Americans are still waiting. A quarterly wage index administered by Payscale, the compensation-analytics firm, found that income actually fell by 0.9% from the first quarter to the second quarter of this year.