Companies are in desperate need of workers across the country as the economic reopening collides with a tight labor market, but the boom in manual labor job wage growth pre-dates the pandemic. Donna Kauffman, co-owner of a landscaping design and construction company in Colleyville, Texas, said a tightened labor market has pushed her starting wage up to $13.75 per hour, compared to lower wages in previous years.
Economic forecasters like Gary Shilling have been watching blue-collar and manual service wages trend upwards for the last several years, growing at a faster rate than wages for white-collar jobs and reversing a trend that had been in place throughout the past 30 years, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“In general, on the blue collar level, you’re probably going to see higher real incomes,” Shilling recently told CNBC. Shilling says “labor share” — the amount of GDP paid out in wages, salaries, and benefits — which has been in decline for decades is trending higher, while “capital share” — the amount of national income from invested capital — is trending down.
For workers in blue-collar industries such as construction, transportation and manufacturing, and workers in manual service sectors including food service, leisure, hospitality and beauty and health-care services, they’ve seen the highest jump in wages in recent years. Those wages continue to increase post-pandemic.
