Trollminator wrote:
The wage situation is murky. There are structural issues impacting the supply/demand forces. Automation and changing operational landscape of major companies continue to mess with the labor supply "mix". An overall diminishing base of labor supply shouldn't be seen as a sole factor to push wages up. We have to look at the change in overall quality of those jobs and the changing skillset needed for them. For example, should a bookkeeper get paid any more today vs 10 years ago if software has improved enough to significantly facilitate their work? I'm just saying the story changes as you peel the onion.
I agree that not all jobs are equal as they were in 2009 when this bull run began but I think the data suggests wages in general are stagnate across all jobs. It's not just book keepers getting automated, it's engineers not making as much money as they theoretically should. Demand for all jobs is pretty high right now so it's still strange why wages are this flat.
This is actually not a great time to be a corporate executive, from a wealth creation point of view. For example, executives who earn stock options as part of their pay packages are getting them locked in at all time high valuations... which is awful since most likely we will see a market correction soon enough so when they vest they might be exercisable at a significant margin above future prices (you want to exercise stocks at a strike price that is much lower than the market rate, not the other way around).
Well I can argue there's rarely a bad time to be a corporate exec. Without knowing the terms of the stock options they're getting then I don't think you can really make the above claim. Even if they're locked in at all time highs then it's all unrealized gains anyways.