We provide new evidence on the cyclicality of employers' real labor costs using BLS establishment job data for the 1982–2018 period. Average straight-time wages have become countercyclical since the financial crisis and the subsequent Great Recession. So have benefit expenditures and overall labor costs, as well as major benefit expenditures, including health insurance and Social Security. Consistent with prior literature, we find that total earnings—the sum of straight-time wages, bonuses, and overtime earnings—were procyclical before 2008; even earnings have become countercyclical since then. The increasing countercyclicality of labor costs is largely attributable to periods with below-trend GDP.

中文翻译：

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美国平均劳动力成本周期性变化的新证据

我们使用 1982 年至 2018 年期间的 BLS 机构工作数据提供了有关雇主实际劳动力成本周期性的新证据。自金融危机和随后的大萧条以来，平均连续工资已成为反周期。福利支出和总体劳动力成本以及主要福利支出（包括健康保险和社会保障）也是如此。与先前的文献一致，我们发现总收入——即直接工资、奖金和加班收入的总和——在 2008 年之前是顺周期性的；从那时起，甚至收益也变得反周期。劳动力成本的反周期性增加主要是由于 GDP 低于趋势的时期。