Want to know why voters are angry? I’ll show you in pictures. 
ADP® Pay Insights
Last week, ADP released Pay Insights for September 2025.
ADP only reports nominal wages. My lead chart shows nominal and real wages, adjusted by the PCE Price index, the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation.
ADP data starts with November 2020. Real wages peaked in May of 2025.
Median and Real PCE-Adjusted Wages Percent Change Since 2021-05
- Male Nominal: +6.6 percent to 69,200.
- Male Real: -9.4 percent to 54,366.
- Female Nominal: +7.3 percent to 51,400.
- Female Real: -8.8 percent to 40,382.
Data and calculations through August. ADP provided nominal data through September, but we do not have price indexes for September.
Due to the government shutdown, I do not know when we will have them.
Adjusted using a CPI deflator makes things look worse.
Median and Real CPI-Adjusted Wages
Median and Real CPI-Adjusted Wages Percent Change Since 2021-05
- Male Nominal: +6.6 percent to 69,200.
- Male Real: -11.5 percent to 52.134.
- Female Nominal: +7.3 percent to 51,400.
- Female Real: -10.1 percent to 39,099.
Real Wage Synopsis Since May 2021
- CPI-Adjusted Male: -11.5 percent
- PCE-Adjusted Male: -9.4 percent
- CPI-Adjusted Female: -10.1 percent
- PCE-Adjusted Female: -8.8 percent
Trump campaigned on curing inflation.
Since January 2025, CPI-adjusted pay is down 1.7 percent for men and is unchanged for women.
Since January 2025, PCE-adjusted pay is down 1.9 percent for men and is down 1.1 percent for women.
Presumptions
These numbers presume you believe PCE and CPI measures of inflation are accurate.
I don’t. Do you?
Neither the CPI nor the PCE includes property taxes, or homeowners’ insurance in their measures.
Both include content insurance if your house burns down or is ripped up by a hurricane, but neither includes the house itself.
And when eating out, tips are not included. Heck that’s an expected 20 percent of the bill.
Is Homeowners Insurance Understated in the CPI?
I discussed homeowners insurance on August 11, 2025 in Is Homeowners Insurance Understated in the CPI? Shop Around!
Our Insurance went up by $2,000. Then another $2,000. Here’s our story.
Also consider Where Do You Spend Money on Food? How Screwed Up Are the BLS Weights?
Does the BLS match your budget?
Don’t worry, Trump says “There is virtually no inflation.”
Nonetheless, he has changed his message: Trump Adopts Chicago Cubs’ Perpetual Message, “Wait Till Next Year”
“One Big Beautiful Bill” did not resonate. Trump opts for “Wait Till 2026”.
Forgive me for pointing out Trump’s math is worse than BLS math.
Reader: Nice. Now do “since 1999” or “since 2007”. A worse, more chronic condition emerges, transcending some White House term.
Me: I would love to go further back.
I went back as far as I could. That’s all the data ADP has.
I would have at least wanted to go back to 2017, then 2007.
But no go.
Regarding comparisons to BLS hourly wages.
The BLS is “average” hourly wage.
ADP is “median” annual wage.
True. And average real wage growth tends to grow faster than median growth. No wonder that the median American voter is mad as hell. Why he/she would vote for an accomplished BS artist to do something about the miserable median real wage trend is one of the great secrets of recent American politics.
And ironically, Trump’s immigration policies will make the median American worker even more angry. By removing poor immigrant workers, the median worker becomes a sub-median worker and has fewer workers he/she can look down upon. Put differently, Trump’s immigration policies is turning this already angry crowd into total social losers.
I am confused because all three potential candidates were BS specialists.
If real wages were represented by these numbers you would say workers are doing worse off because the median pay declined.
1,1,1,2,6,7,7,7,7 the median is 6. The average is 4.3
5,5,5,5,5,10,10,10,10 the median is 5. The average is 7.2.
The real wages drastically increased in the second example. The average is the only thing that matters. Median makes zero sense when talking about real wages and the economy.
Ridiculous
And a simple thought experiment shows why
Elon Musk walks into a bar of 50 people. The average wage soars to 10 million or whatever.
The median wage may not change at all.
Economists use median wages for a reason.
No matter.
In the last month the S&P500 has added more than $2 trillion to stockholder wealth.
Every 110 points == $1 trillion market cap.
I.e., mostly to the wealth of the top 10%, who account for 50% of consumer spending.
As something like 70% of 401k contributions are now on autopilot into stock ETFs, mostly S&P500 ETFs, and the Mag7 are now 34% of that index, as long as the 401k inflow from workers exceeds the outflow from retirees and unemployed forced to sell those ETFs to get cash disbursements to pay living expenses, stock prices will continue to soar. 2022 gave final proof that any decline in stock prices can be only transitory. And all “know” the Fed will slash rates to ensure stocks keep rising (if not while Powell remains Fed head till early 2026, certainly soon after when a Trump sycophant takes over.)
Recession == slashed interest rates. Helicopter money.
The top 10% will become 60%, 70% of consumer spending.
The little people just don’t matter any more.
yeah F&CK the little guy , Mish may agree also
My raises have been very small to none the past few years. Luckily stock market gains are making up for the devalued salary. I max out my 401k every year. Plus bought a rental property to help capture inflation that hits my paycheck.
It is interesting to contemplate that reduction in real wages is one of the adjustments typically accomplished in a recession, crucial to allowing businesses to return to profitability. 9% isn’t insignificant. And yet, officially we’ve had no recession.
Apologies if my comment below that these wage numbers are an artifact of Covid did not use numbers to demonstrate this. ADP wage data seem to start only in October 2020. Thus, let’s take the median weekly real earnings for all workers, available from FRED going back to 1979. Using this series, cumulative real wage growth since October 2020 was exactly zero. However, if we look at cumulative real wage growth since October 2019, removing the Covid employment composition effect, it was 5.0 percent, which gives an annual average of 1 percent. This is pretty bad, but it’s the same rate as during the first Trump administration until Covid hit, and it’s much better than the miserable average annual real wage growth received by the median worker since 1980 (only 0.3 percent).
“Forgive me for pointing out Trump’s math is worse than BLS math.”
Well fire him and appoint a new one.
What if you counted all the wages that were 0 of all the unemployed over all time ? That would give you a true picture of median wages and show that even in boom times, median wages did not increase much at all. Median wages only counts those with wages correct ?
Cherry picking the starting point for the % change but clearly the trend is there. Rolling three or six month average probably a fairer assesment
“These numbers presume you believe PCE and CPI measures of inflation are accurate.”
I agree with an emphatic NO, which unfortunately means the real median annual wage is down even more than 9%.
Great article / data, Mish!
The latter stage of inflationary depression will be shortages. Some are starting to appear now.
What are we running short of?
Accountability?
Truth?
Freedom?
Equal protection under the law?
>
El Pedo, how about patience with ever increasing prices?
Is that a good enough answer?
No, it isn’t, but it’s the kind of obtuse, non-answer I’ve come to expect from you. Carry on.
Wait. The King of Obtuse answers is calling me out.
That makes my day! Thanks, El Pedo!
Other than gold, what is in short supply, exactly?
Plenty of oil.
Plenty of food.
Plenty of clothes in the stores…
Nice. Now do “since 1999” or “since 2007”. A worse, more chronic condition emerges, transcending some White House term.
Nice. Now do “since 1999” or “since 2007”. A worse, more chronic condition emerges, transcending some White House term.
I would love to go further back.
I went back as far as I could. That’s all the data ADP has.
I would have at least wanted to go back to 2017, then 2007.
But no go.
I checked this by doing what I thought would be an equivalent comparison in FRED, and got a different result.
I used the FRED series “Average Hourly Earnings of Production and Nonsupervisory Employees, Total Private” (AHETPI), and the CPI for All Urban Consumers (CPIUACSL). Those should be similar to the data used by Mish, but they give different results.
The graph of AHETPI normalized to CPIUACSL shows reasonable growth.
It shows a sustained uptrend from 2012 with a COVID spike (upwards) in 2020-2021.
Since the inflation numbers should be similar, I wonder what’s different about the ADP data series compared to the hourly wages series in FRED?
One way to reconcile this would be if the workers tracked by ADP are getting fewer hours, and therefore lower total pay, despite rising hourly pay as shown by the FRED series? Or if managers (not in the FRED series) got wage cuts, but production workers’ wages rose?
Alternatively, the median used by ADP is vulnerable to shifts in the “mix”. If ADP now has more low-wage workers in their pool, that would lower the median even if every single worker was getting paid more.
P.S. If I do the comparison using PCE instead of CPI, the wage growth appears even stronger. No wonder the Fed likes PCE, it provides a fig leaf for them to pretend inflation is lower.
Hourly wages are averages.
ADP is median annual wages.
So much distraction to hide the fact that life isn’t getting better/easier for the majority
Just wait until millions lose insurance or have to cough up double or triple to save themselves from a lifetime of crippling debt
That, and not a buck more on a jar of coffee, might wake them up
Why do you think this admin is trial-running troops in the cities
The wealthy want less democracy, not more
The time is coming when the unbalance of wealth will ignite the population and the abuse of brown minimum wage workers will not amuse or distract
And the admin is in a race to establish the federal troops as a fact before the really big bites start to happen
See fourth turning by Neal Howe
I just paid my first tarriff on an imported item, and it actually felt good. Almost all of my purchases are domestic items. When I deviated from my normal pattern, I just paid the tarriff and became part of the solution rather than the problem. I consistently plan my purchases to give a fellow American a job. The job I save maybe my own, or a neighbor, friend, or family members job.
Congratulations.
You paid more and will save zero jobs.
But hey, if it makes you feel better paying more, then OK.
But you are brainwashed.
I don’t save jobs, I create jobs.
Americans need to stop playing for Americans to not loose. Americans need to play for Americans to Win.
That is not allowed anymore, didn’t you get the memo?
Mish
Please explain how buying US made products rather than foreign made products when both are available does not help increase or maintain US jobs. Your statement above makes no sense to me.
Hey! You can pay my tariff too… it’ll feel fantastic!
El Pedo, no you have to pay that yourself?
Your tariff just became additional revenue for the government. How they will spend it nobody knows. But I suspect you are paying tariffs on items you don’t realize. Recently I had to buy repair parts for my “American” made vehicle. There is an identical version sold in Europe hence parts are made in both America and Europe. The OEM repair parts came from Slovenia. I didn’t buy from the dealer so I don’t know if there was a tariff or not.There are many, many repair parts for all kinds of industrial machinery made abroad, especially Europe. You will never know if you are indirectly paying for tariffs.
I am neither a tax and spend Democrat, or borrow and spend Republican. But out of all the tremendous taxes I pay, tarriffs bother me the least.
You did pay tariffs in those domestic items indirectly, because they more than likely used imported components.
PS: how can I send you my tariff bills, since you enjoy paying them?
I buy domestically produced items. If they contain foreign built sub- componants, then the manufacturer payed the tarriff. Some domestic producer will fill the gab and the tarriffs will have achieved the desired affect
Credit where due – there is no inflation in wages.
Many years ago I watched a movie called “War Games”.
Simplistically, it demonstrated how there were no winning strategies in a nuclear war. All scenarios led to global annihilation of the vast majority of our species. Given that trade wars lead to Hot Wars, what has changed?
Are we on a path to global war?
This government is investing a Trillion dollars in the Department of War and gutting education and restricting freedom of speech.
What could go wrong?
>>>
So, you got nothing on-topic here, and want to reminisce about 1980s movies?
Wasting a trillion dollars on “defense” affects inflation.
The inflation Mish is reporting on occurred well before the trillion dollar defense budgets.
Defense spending as a share of GDP has been at postwar historic lows throughout the inflation that Mish is reporting on.
Finally, defense spending can be deflationary as well as inflationary.
Historically, defense spending drives technological innovation that reduces production costs for consumer goods. There’s a huge list of examples. And soldiers in the military also don’t buy as many consumer goods, lowering demand, which also tends to reduce prices for those goods.
I do agree that Federal spending on education is primarily inflationary, because I haven’t seen that it had any measurable impact on the quality of eduction… just its cost.
The current crop of Western “leaders” (who are all wildly unpopular with their citizens) all believe nuclear war can’t happen. “Russia is bluffing” about resorting to nuclear weapons if they think their survival as the Russian Federation is at risk. Western “leaders” seem determined to test the validity of their “Russia is bluffing” belief. Macron is building a big bunker, though, so at least he considers nuclear war a real possibility.
The pigs at the top are making more than ever, however, and they’re happy to see the military turned against the filthy proles.
Hey! I’m one of those filthy proles…
Better clean my fingernails!
>
The filth of poor don’t wash off…
El Pedo, yes it does.
Well Dayammm Bubba!
>
Economic mobility = Socialism. You get born with it, or you stole it.
El Pedo, no they’re not!
Just buy meme stocks! Which is apparently how this unfolds.
Stupid times require stupid strategies.
El Pedo, no they don’t. Use your head!
This is the kind of great investigative reporting that the MSM will never cover. Mish’s claim to fame.
Thanks – I have this by race too but it takes a while to compile.
Mish
At least men still earn more than women.
Good to know Mish has at least 3 women readers.
Dr Jordan Peterson points out that the studies show that there are 19 reasons why, over a lifetime, men earn more than women. One of them is unfair discrimination – it accounts for 5%. The rest is the result of men working on average, longer hours per week, more weeks per year, more years in their lifetime; and the genders naturally sorting themselves out into the type of work they are suited to and prefer.
= gold $3980
enjoy!!
How quickly will we get to testing the $4,000 level?
It seems like a huge psychological barrier to me. But Sith the geopolitical risks rising and our debt rising so fast under trumps disastrous policies who knows.
Damn glad I have some great mining stocks! They are kicking ass!
=How quickly will we get to testing the $4,000 level?
if you look at 2025 chart. there was huge consolidation 6*-7 month around 3400*3500, and after breakout, it has been only up.
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we have not even had proper correction in gold yet. down to 50avg
, and-or breaking down 20avg
i guess top will be higher 4100*4200. then again a few months consolidation, after that 4500 *4800 in 2026!!
GOLD IS JUST MIRROR OF USA DEBT CHART. and ain;t pretty!
But is this good or bad?
In the last gold boom to 2011, the Aussie dollar was 10% stronger than the $US – today its a third weaker. So $US4,000 gold = $AUD6,000! Bonanza time for Aussie gold miners….
No doubt, taco will maintain this trend with his ill-fated policies and lack of leadership.
I don’t think he has many stroke vacations left in him. I’d be surprised if he makes it to Easter.
El Pedo, stop worrying about Trump so much. He’s going to be fine.
Couldn’t that decline in the median wage simply be an artifact of the employment impact of Covid? When Covid hit, job losses were concentrated among the lower-paid workers, and the median wage, by its statistical construction, had to jump in 2020-21. After 2021, these lower-paid workers came back to be gainfully employed and this had to depress median wages. Can we look instead at the wage data using 2019 as the base? Having said all of this, real median wage growth over the long run in the US has been truly dismal, and it was certainly a key source of today’s political mayhem.
Do keep in mind, and you are using the best numbers you can relative, I can come up with a more accurate number for “CPI” then the idiots who put that together. I will always harken back to my Math for Economists class at Fordham, with priest teaching it, (great teacher by the way) and he was great because he would first show us the mechanics of all sorts of equations/calculations then give us the theory after the fact. He showed us what was at the time still the 1990 CPI being used. After he put it on the board, showed us how it is used he then asked us by a show of hands how many of us thought it was relatively accurate- no one raised their hands. If a bunch of Junior and Senior’s at Fordham could understand that, well enough said. Nothing I have seen since tells me it has gotten better- in fact it has become far more unhinged from reality since.
No way after COVID and all that that wrought that this would not be the case- in fact, considering the disruption of all of that I would have thought it would have been even more significant of a drop. We will be doing studies on all of that and the impact it had for decades to come.
The talking heads are foaming at the mouth over AMD’s circular financing deal with Open AI.
How much hot air can be stuffed into the AI bubble?
>>>. MOAH POWAH SCOTTY!!!
Its 1999 all over again!
It’s actually a lot worse than 1999.
These companies will all wind up like Lucent Technologies – penny stocks.
Most voters are too stupid to understand when they are voting against their own best interests. We dumbed down the education system enough that most people aren’t smart enough to do better than swallowing whatever propaganda their party provides.
Woke shame or 24/7 flag-waving noisemakers: take your pick.
Trump’s Team Hones Message on Economy: Just Wait Until 2026
https://archive.is/20251006024801/https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/trumps-team-hones-a-new-message-pledging-economic-gains-next-year-3e9f8397#selection-537.0-537.59
But… how can it get better than the Golden Age that started day one?
El Pedo, you’re not allowed to participate in the Golden Age.
This indicates a falling standard of living for most US citizens.
Given the power of corporations in our society and the lack of representation for most Americans, I do not see this as a surprise.
In inflationary times those with the slowest access to capital (lagging wages) fall behind, while those with access to capital (investments) pull ahead.
When bubbles burst, those with investments take a hit while wages for labor catch up, slowly.
While this is an over simplification, it does give a picture of why our society is seeing the lower classes fall so far behind…
Wasn’t the period 2021 to 2024 the Biden Administration, and Bidenomics?
Its sad that Trump was the only alterrnative. Biden’s use of unethical lawfare seemed to backfire and galvanize support for Trump. Now Trump is doing the same. I used to be upset at how the Biden crime family was enriching themselves, but now the Trump family is doing the same. Not a peep of this unethical behavior from the conservative media. The media depending on political ideology have become lapdogs.
Both sides led up to this moment. The decay unfolded over decades of tit for tat. There is also both parties’ successive over-delegation of congressional powers to the presidency, which goes back to the paralysis of Congress, which goes back to the small-mindedness of voters. Getting a Dem president is a scary prospect now too. SCOTUS may live to regret some of its recent holdings. If the IEEPA tariffs are OK’d, I expect the next Dem president to declare a global climate catastrophe and completely muck up the productive economy and global stability for that angle. Then of course to stack the agencies including especially the Fed with apparatchiks from Day One. The system is decaying before our eyes. Will it reach runaway oscillations?
Sorry that you are not capable of confirming this for yourself.
Writing checks to everyone regardless of their productivity would logically lead to dilution of everyone’s buying power. It is the simplest concept in economics.
Writing checks to banks and Wall St. doesn’t seem to dilute their command of the economy, quite the contrary. Alas, it’s only good when the prole gets the crumbs.
Absolutely
Declining real wages simply means businesses are able to increase prices at a higher pace than they feel the need to increase labor wages. Economically, that should result in higher payouts to shareholders and higher asset prices. Which we see. So the question is what would change this dynamic? And should it be changed? In a global market, we can trade 1000 poor people buying products for 1 overpaid American easily. This isn’t 1965 anymore, where you local labor union will negotiate fat pay increases for you. Those days are long gone.