Most jobs added since recession ended pay slave wages

While a majority of jobs lost during the downturn were in the middle range of wages, a majority of those added during the recovery have been low-paying, according to a new report from the National Employment Law Project. The disappearance of midwage, midskill jobs is part of a longer-term trend that some refer to as a hollowing out of the workforce, though it has probably been accelerated by government layoffs.

“The overarching message here is we don’t just have a jobs deficit; we have a ‘good jobs’ deficit," said Annette Bernhardt, the report’s author and a policy co-director at the National Employment Law Project, a liberal research and advocacy group. The report looked at 366 occupations tracked by the Labor Department, and clumped them into three equal groups by wage, with each representing a third of U.S. employment in 2008.

The middle-third — occupations in fields like construction, manufacturing and information with median hourly wages of $13.84 to $21.13 — accounted for 60 percent of job losses from the beginning of 2008 to early 2010. The job market has turned around since then, but those fields have represented only 22 percent of total job growth. Read more >>