At my (soon-to-be-former) workplace, we’ve seen wages fall steadily since last January from a combination of furlough days, weird tax increases that are not “really” tax increases (but that manage to bite into your take-home pay anyway), and various incomprehensible schemes whose net effect is to take income away from workers.

For example, last night my associate editor forwarded a message from HR informing her that when the administration switched her job status behind her back last March, without telling her (a strategy allowing them to fire her at will, instead of having to treat her fairly according to the employee manual’s rules), dreadful PeopleSoft failed to enroll her in the mandatory retirement plan, and so they’re going to gouge all the back payments out of her piddling salary at once. Since she earns less than she earned when she was a graduate assistant (!), this will mean her next paycheck will contain little or no pay.

My gross pay has dropped $500/month. My net has gone from $1537 to $1418 per paycheck, a net cut in pay of $240 a month.

Net effect on morale? Well, I’m being laid off in December, and to tell you the truth, I’ve come to hate my job and my employer so much that I’m seriously thinking of quitting forthwith. If I wait until September, COBRA will carry me through to Medicare — although it will cost me more, the savings in stress, annoyance, and outright fury will be considerable. When I walk, my entire office will shut down, since it’s unlikely the university can find anyone competent and willing do my arcane job for just a few months. I can’t wait to be out of that place…and that sentiment, alas, is shared by every single fellow worker I know.

I am just curious as to know if there are any examples of of economies going through deflationary pressures and still maintaining the same wage rate as before?