#wage-growth

#wage-growth

By the numbers: Marion County's paycheck increase brought Indy's average weekly wages to $1,779, or around $137 more a week than last year's average pay, per BLS' preliminary numbers. In Hamilton County, average weekly wages rose 2.6%, or around $38, to $1,476. Hendricks County wages rose 2.2%, or around $35, to $1,083. Caveat: The data tracks where people earn their money, not where they live.

In a move that comes as no surprise, the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has voted to keep interest rates unchanged at 4%. The decision reflects the MPC's concern that inflation, which held steady at 3.8% in August, remains too far above the 2% target to justify an early easing. Persistent wage growth and services inflation are the key reasons for this cautious stance, with underlying price pressures proving slow to unwind.

"The year started with strong job growth, but that momentum has been whipsawed by uncertainty," Nela Richardson, ADP's chief economist, said in the press release.She cited a mix of factors that are weighing on hiring decisions, "including labor shortages, skittish consumers, and AI disruptions."ADP's August report is among the first to namecheck AI disruptions, a rare admission that artificial intelligence is now beginning to reshape hiring sentiment.

There's more troubling news for the white-collar job market: wage growth is falling short of inflation. A Bankrate analysis used employment cost index and consumer price index data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to look at how the gap between wage and salary growth and inflation has changed since 2021. The difference allowed Bankrate to identify the industries with better worker bargaining power. Financial activities and professional and business services fell on the wrong side of that divide. Wage growth falling behind inflation in those sectors adds to the bleak picture of the white-collar labor market.

The impact of genAI on hiring has been stark, as companies grapple with cleaning, organizing, and sharing data stores for potential use by the technology.