Greg Sandoval/Business Insider
Wage growth has been surprisingly slow.
- Low unemployment should mean fast wage growth - but we haven't seen that in recent years.
- Three economists shared with Business Insider their insights as to why pay hasn't gone up much.
- The leading reason: Companies are prioritizing shareholder interest over their employees.
- Unemployment also isn't as low as we believe it to be. Part of the reason more people aren't participating in the workforce is, again, because wages are too low.
The US economy is growing at its fastest pace in four years. Unemployment recently sank to an 18-year low. That's all led President Donald Trump to deem America as "the economic envy of the entire world."
But, you wouldn't know that by looking at your pay stub. Wage growth has been "sluggish," as Business Insider's Rich Feloni recently reported.
Andy Kiersz/Business Insider
Even our nation's top economists are baffled. Such low unemployment should mean that employers are kicking up pay in order to lure in workers. Yet, they're not.
There's no single reason for why wage growth has been dismal. Business Insider spoke to three economists to shed light on their theories on the conundrum: Jake Rosenfeld of the University of Washington in St. Louis, Economic Policy Institute senior economist Heidi Shierholz, and Brookings Institution senior fellow Jay Shambaugh.
Here's what they shared: