[JumpCrisscross]

> Maybe that Axios journalist isn't the smartest

You're both right. Real wages are down from the pandemic, but that's because they spiked massively due to the stimulus spending [1]. Real wages today are where they were in Q1 2020, which was the highest they had been since at least 1982.

Both the Axios and Journal charts are confusing because they're taking the first derivative of a complex curve.

[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q

[PaulDavisThe1st]

Thanks for posting that graph. When I went to FRED to get it, i only got a data series to 2022. I consider this be the most definitive measure that I've seen yet.

[s1artibartfast]

Tangent:

How do you navigate Fred effectively? I can usually find something close to what I want, but not exact through Google searches of the site.

[JumpCrisscross]

> How do you navigate Fred effectively?

Kagi :P. I know the names of most of these data series, so it’s searching e.g. real weekly earnings fed fred.

[s1artibartfast]

thanks!