Open thread for night owls: Lower pay for new graduates follows them for life

The Wall Street Journal puts up a paywall for most articles, so unless you subscribe or engage the site with go-around software, you won't be able to read the whole piece I am going to excerpt below. And since I can't get permission for a longer excerpt as I usually do, this will be short. And, like so much information about the labor market these days: frustrating, troubling, even infuriating. Reporting on a new study from the Conference Board, Kathleen Madigan writes:

U.S. wage growth between 2008 and 2010 was the lowest since at least the 1960s. The big reasons: high unemployment diminished workers' bargaining power, and many laid-off workers and graduates were 'willing to accept jobs at lower wage rates than they originally expected,' the report said. [...]

Of course, not all labor groups are created equal. One very disturbing finding is how far new college graduates have fallen behind.

The board found median wages for new graduates with a university degree declined in both 2009 and 2010. Even with a bounce in 2011, Levanon said the starting pay for new grads is below the pay in 2008'and that is before inflation is taken into account.

"Before inflation is taken into account" is shorthand for before reality is considered. In other words, it's worse than it first appears.

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