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Re:America is building chip factories. Now to find the workers by giantg2 on Friday August 25, 2023 @06:54AM (#37260229)
It's also possible that we've already peaked as a society and we can't continue to have infinite higher standard of living. Real wages have declined over the past 50 years. Due to both resource consumption/demand and environmental impact it may not be feasible for the next generation to have the same things as the previous generation. Even shifts like a secondary economy transitioning to a tertiary economy can cut out more people due to the demand for high skill/education. Despite all this, standard of living has gone up, even for the less fortunate if you compare to the past, mostly due to the quality of goods and the advantage of trade with poorer nations. When that might end or reverse is anyone's guess.

But yes, inequality has also gone up as you point out. Raising other people's salaries is probably the best way to deal with this while staying in the current paradigm. Although raising chip worker wages isn't going to change inequality - you'd have to apply this to other jobs like retail, food service, custodial, etc.

Re:America is building chip factories. Now to find the workers by mech765 on Friday August 25, 2023 @08:11AM (#37260803)
Real wages have risen over the last 50 years.
Re:America is building chip factories. Now to find the workers by wildrhythms on Friday August 25, 2023 @08:33AM (#37260971)
It's about purchasing power; not just real wages.

>despite some ups and downs over the past several decades, today’s real average wage (that is, the wage after accounting for inflation) has about the same purchasing power it did 40 years ago. And what wage gains there have been have mostly flowed to the highest-paid tier of workers.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-...

Re:America is building chip factories. Now to find the workers by gottorf on Friday August 25, 2023 @10:31AM (#37262145)
> It's about purchasing power; not just real wages.

Real wage means purchasing power parity, or it should. These two statements cannot be true, if they are using the same definition of inflation:

- Real wages have risen over the past 50 years

- Today's real average wage has about the same purchasing power it did 40 years ago

The methodology must be different.