In advanced economies, nominal wage growth and inflation have been falling in secular terms since the early 1980s. Drawing on debates on industrial composition and industrial dualism, I argue that a key driver of falling wage growth and inflation has been the growing share of employment in “stagnant services”: those with limited productivity growth, competitive product markets, and thin profit margins. In these services, it is difficult to raise wages and prices. I use these insights to revisit Baumol's cost disease theory, arguing that weak wage growth in stagnant services has spilled over to other sectors with more room for wage growth, resulting in the gradual disinflation observed in recent decades. Using graphical plots and error correction models of nominal wage growth and inflation in 21 advanced economies from 1972-2009, the analysis shows that employment growth in stagnant services over this period was associated with a reduction of nominal wage growth and inflation by more than half. Without deep changes in stagnant services, slow wage and price growth are here to stay.

在发达经济体，自 1980 年代初以来，名义工资增长和通胀长期下降。借鉴关于工业构成和工业二元论的辩论，我认为工资增长和通货膨胀下降的一个关键驱动因素是“停滞的服务”就业份额的增加：那些生产力增长有限、产品市场竞争激烈和利润率微薄的服务。在这些服务中，很难提高工资和价格。我用这些见解重新审视了鲍莫尔的成本病理论，认为停滞的服务业的疲软工资增长已经蔓延到工资增长空间更大的其他部门，导致近几十年来观察到的逐步通货紧缩。使用 1972-2009 年 21 个发达经济体名义工资增长和通货膨胀的图形和误差修正模型，分析表明，这一时期停滞的服务业的就业增长与名义工资增长和通货膨胀减少一半以上有关。如果停滞的服务没有深刻变化，缓慢的工资和价格增长就会持续下去。