Index shows wages inching up

Private-sector workers are likely to see slightly larger increases in their wages later this year, according to BNA, an Arlington, Va., news and information-services company. 

The prediction is based on the company’s revised second-quarter Wage Trend Indicator, which now stands at 98.21, up from 98.01 in the first quarter.

BNA expects annual private-sector wages to rise about 2 percent by the end of the year, compared with a year earlier, and based on the current pace of economic recovery. Wages rose 1.6 percent in the first quarter.

“The economy is still moving forward — it’s just not moving forward very fast,” said economist Kathryn Kobe, a consultant who helped develop BNA’s wage indicator. “We’re seeing small incremental improvements in the labor market,” Kobe said.

The latest quarterly data for Long Island wages shows a much higher year-over-year increase in private-sector wages.

Wages averaged $12,602 in the third quarter of last year, up about 5 percent from $11,997 in the year-earlier quarter, according to New York Labor Department data. 

Thursday the department will report the May employment numbers for Long Island. In April, the Long Island economy had 6,200 more private-sector jobs than a year earlier, a significant slowdown in growth.