Wages 2021
Wage growth fell at higher wage levels in 2021: Real annual composition-adjusted wage growth by percentile, alternative and calendar years, 2020–2021
| Percentile | Alternative year | Calendar year |
|---|---|---|
| 5th | 0.4% | 1.1% |
| 10th | 0.7% | 1.1% |
| 15th | 0.6% | 1.0% |
| 20th | 0.3% | 0.6% |
| 25th | 0.0% | 0.3% |
| 30th | -0.5% | -0.1% |
| 35th | -0.9% | -0.5% |
| 40th | -1.4% | -0.9% |
| 45th | -1.8% | -1.2% |
| 50th | -2.1% | -1.5% |
| 55th | -2.4% | -1.7% |
| 60th | -2.5% | -1.8% |
| 65th | -2.7% | -1.9% |
| 70th | -2.8% | -2.0% |
| 75th | -2.9% | -2.2% |
| 80th | -3.0% | -2.3% |
| 85th | -3.1% | -2.4% |
| 90th | -3.2% | -2.7% |
Notes: “Alternative year 2020–2021” refers to changes between the initial 12 months of the pandemic (March 2020--February 2021) and the most recent 12 months of the pandemic (March 2021–February 2022). “Calendar year 2020--2021” refers to changes between January–December 2020 and January–December 2021. Wages are adjusted for inflation to February 2022 dollars using the CPI-U-RS. Wage changes are available only up to the 90th percentile because of topcoding issues (see Gould, deCourcy, and Mokhiber 2022).
Source: Authors’ analysis of Current Population Survey Outgoing Rotation Group microdata, EPI Current Population Survey Extracts, Version 1.0.27 (2022), https://microdata.epi.org.
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