American Wages Have Actually Been Falling for 46 yearsBy Joshua Krause Another key figure is the relationship between productivity and wages. While the average worker is nearly 2.5 times more productive now than he or she was in 1948, the wages of our workers have been stagnant. Hourly wages grew at nearly the same exact rate as productivity until the early 1970s, at which point they suddenly stopped growing, even as our workers grew more productive than they had ever been before. Both of those statistics are frequently cited, but they dont really paint a full picture of how bad this situation is. They make it sound like the middle class has merely stagnated. But when you adjust these statistics for inflation, and consider where the benefits GDP growth has flowed towards, its obvious that the middle class has been gutted over the years. The wages of the bottom half of income earners has actually fallen by 4.6% since 1973, while the top 5% of income earners received a 51.4% pay raise. Meanwhile, American wages as a percentage of GDP have been falling for 46 years. While GDP per capita hasnt really stopped growing in the big scheme of things, the average household income peaked in 1999 and never recovered. If the earnings of the average worker hadnt so wildly diverged from productivity and GDP growth, the average household income would be $13,500 higher right now. Instead this money has been siphoned off to the owners and shareholders of major corporations, as well as the government through taxes. These two forces, the corporations and the government, have been working together to bleed the middle class dry, and theyve been succeeding for decades. Joshua Krause is a reporter, writer and researcher at The Daily Sheeple. He was born and raised in the Bay Area and is a freelance writer and author. You can follow Joshuas reports at Facebook or on his personal Twitter. Joshuas website is Strange Danger. Its all price fixing all the time the gold collar scum crowd own all the major corprations. 