The average job today (as of 2017) pays 11 times as much per hour in constant dollars as it did a century ago.
Mostly false False in substance, right in a detail.
Factual: Statements about the present or the past, checked against the record: did they hold up?
The second judge would not resolve this claim; the verdict shown is the first judge's.
What would count as true or false
Compare average hourly pay (in inflation-adjusted constant dollars) for US jobs circa 2017 with circa 1917, using published wage series (e.g., BLS, historical statistics, economic historians). True: the ratio is roughly 11 (about 9.5–12.5). Mostly true: the ratio is a clear large multiple near 11 (about 8–9.5 or 12.5–14), or the 11x figure appears in a credible source but depends on a particular deflator or measure. Mixed: credible series disagree, some supporting about 11x and others well away from it. Mostly false: the real increase is large but far from 11x (e.g., under 8x or over 14x), or the figure rests on a mismeasured basis such as total compensation versus wages taken out of context. False: the evidence shows a ratio nowhere near 11 (e.g., under 5x or over 20x).
Set before the research began.
Evidence (3)
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E1 WHUS: The Declining Growth in the Well-Being of the Average American Manufacturing Production Worker in the Twentieth Century John H. Pencavel, Department of Economics, Stanford University · 5 May 2023
“real hourly compensation in 2000 was almost seven times its level in 1900 and he worked in 2000 almost”
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E2 American Labor in the 20th Century U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Compensation and Working Conditions (by Donald M. Fisk) · 30 January 2003
“The average hourly pay of manufacturing production workers in 1999 was $13.90; in 1909, the first measured year, it was about $3.80 (in 1999”
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E3 Measuring Worth MeasuringWorth (Lawrence H. Officer and Samuel H. Williamson) · 1 January 2007
“So the increase in the series over time exaggerates the real (deflated) cost of labor.”
Reasoning
E2 (BLS) puts average hourly pay of manufacturing production workers at $13.90 in 1999 versus about $3.80 in 1909 in 1999 dollars, roughly a 3.7x real increase. E1 (Stanford economist Pencavel) finds real hourly compensation in 2000 was almost seven times its 1900 level for the same group. Both series show a large real increase, but well under 11x, though they cover a narrower group and slightly different periods than the claim. E3 notes that the increase in its wage series over time exaggerates the real (deflated) cost of labor.
Cite this claim
Ray Kurzweil, “The average job today (as of 2017) pays 11 times as much per hour in constant dollars as it did a century ago.” (said March 2017). Verdict: mostly false. Reliability API, claim c_561107ee35ca, method 0.1.0+28da144b, dataset release v1.1.2. https://epistacklabs.com/claims/c_561107ee35ca
This claim is in dataset release v1.1.2, with the same verdict.
Reply to this claim
More factual claims by Ray Kurzweil
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Resolved true
“They were correct that things like the cotton jenny and so on did eliminate lots of these jobs.”
Inventions like the spinning jenny did eliminate many jobs, as the Luddites claimed.
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Mixed
“Yet for every job that was eliminated, we invented several new ones”
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Mostly false
“That was not true a year ago. But that’s true today.”
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Resolved true
“In 1999, I predicted 2029 for AGI and I still predict 2029.”
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Mixed
“AI hallucinations are still there, but are becoming much less frequent.”
AI hallucinations persist but are becoming much less frequent.
Verdicts are made automatically; how verdicts are made.