The Wage Standard: What’s Wrong in the Labor Market and How to Fix It (with Arin Dube)

In this episode of Pitchfork Economics, Nick Hanauer welcomes Arin Dube, a leading economist and author of The Wage Standard: What's Wrong with the Labor Market and How to Fix It, to discuss the deepening crisis in the U.S. labor market and the structural failures that have led to stagnant wages despite rising productivity. Dube traces the breakdown to the 1980s, when the federal minimum wage was frozen, leading to a growing gap between worker pay and productivity. He argues that wages are not determined by impersonal market forces alone, but by corporate choices, institutional power, policy decisions, and cultural ideologies—especially the rise of shareholder-first corporate governance. Drawing on decades of empirical research, including landmark studies on minimum wage hikes, Dube demonstrates that raising wages does not cause job loss, and in many cases boosts productivity and reduces turnover. He highlights the success of wage standards in countries like the UK and emerging models in the U.S., such as sectoral wage boards in Minnesota. The conversation underscores the need for bold policy innovation, including full employment commitments and sectoral bargaining, to rebuild a fairer economy from the middle out.