Volume 38, Number 4 (Fall) 2003
Lettau, Michael K. 2003. "New Estimates for Wage Rate Inequality Using the Employment Cost Index." Journal of Human Resources 38(4):.
The Employment Cost Index measures the change in wage rates for a
fixed set of jobs over time. The separate indices for industry and occupation
groups grew at varying rates during the 1980s. However, their growth rates have
been much more similar since then, which implies that the increase in the wage
rates of low-wage workers relative to middle-wage workers during the 1990s was
due to changes in the mix of jobs.
Had all workers remained in their jobs, the relative wage of low-wage to
middle-wage workers would have remained constant.
Michael K. Lettau is an economist with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. He thanks an anonymous referee and members of the Compensation Research and Program Development Group and the Office of Employment Research and Program Development of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics for their comments. The views expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the view of the Bureau of Labor Statistics or any of its staff. The publicly available data used in this article can be obtained beginning April 2004 through March 2007 from Michael Lettau, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2 Massachusetts Ave. NE, Washington, DC 20212. The author can provide advice on the application process for the confidential data used in this article. Application details can be obtained by contacting the Office of the Commissioner at the same address.
© 2003 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
US ISSN 0022-166X