"When we asked the White House press office for Trump's data source, a spokesperson pointed us to Bureau of Labor Statistics figures for median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, seasonally adjusted. This data shows that median weekly earnings rose from $1,185 in the fourth quarter of 2024 to $1,206 in the second quarter of 2025, which closely aligns with Trump's second term in office."
"Because those figures represent weekly earnings, we multiplied them by 26 to see how much a typical worker gained during the half-year period. Multiplying by 26 weeks produces a cumulative $546 rise in wages. This measure does not include part-time workers, who account for about a quarter of the workforce, or account for inflation. Economists said the White House's chosen dataset isn't as reliable as a different set and the more reliable study shows a smaller wage increase."
A claimed roughly $500 wage increase for the average American worker over the first half of the year relies on median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, seasonally adjusted. Median weekly earnings rose from $1,185 in the fourth quarter of 2024 to $1,206 in the second quarter of 2025; multiplying by 26 weeks yields a cumulative $546 increase. That measure excludes part-time workers, who make up about a quarter of the workforce, and does not account for inflation. Economists favor the BLS average weekly earnings of all private-sector employees from the Current Employment Statistics program, which shows about a $121 cumulative gain over the same period.
Read at www.aljazeera.com
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