But a nagging, lagging indicator lurked beneath the report’s positive topline. Wage growth remains sluggish, up 2.5 percent from a year ago. (The number for lower-wage, so-called production and nonsupervisory workers was even worse, at 2.3 percent.) Gains in worker pay have limped along at roughly that pace since the start of the recession, barely strong enough to stay ahead of inflation. For the previous three decades, by contrast, hourly earnings tended to climb by more than 3 percent year over year.

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Economists aren’t sure what’s going on. Theories abound: Globalization has chased low-skilled jobs abroad where workers are happy to earn even more meager pay for the same work; automation has already enabled a handful of people working with advanced machinery to do what it once took scores more to accomplish; the decline of labor unions has hobbled the ability of workers to negotiate for pay increases; and stalled productivity has checked workers’ value to their employers, likewise limiting their power to demand raises.

All those versions of the case suggest the economy has undergone structural changes inimical to workers, and there’s little that can be done in the short-term, without a major investment, to help them recover. But many policymakers see a more benign force at work, at least in part. That is, there are still some 1.5 million workers, and maybe many more, who are still looking for jobs. Once that slack works its way out of the labor force, this thinking goes, employers will have to compete more for workers, who can then demand higher wages.

The June report offered some support for that diagnosis. The U-6 rate — a broader measure of unemployment that includes those who have quit looking for work because they’ve been discouraged by a tough job market, as well as part-time workers who’d rather be full-time — ticked up from 8.4 percent to 8.6 percent, as a humming economy compelled more people to rejoin the job hunt. Aparna Mathur, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute, says once more of those people find full-time employment, a process she estimates will take about a year, wages inevitably will start rising faster. “This is not the pool of skilled workers who lost their jobs at the beginning of the recession. The fact that they’re finding jobs at all is a good sign,” she says. “Wage growth matters, but the starting point has to be getting a job and then moving up in it.”

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Whatever the combination of factors at work, the phenomenon would seem to hold enormous significance for President Trump, who campaigned on a pledge to deliver for those left behind by the economic recovery. In office, he’s been happy to tout record-breaking stock market rallies as a signal he’s delivering on the economic boom he promised. But poorer Americans are far less likely to own stock. And he’s given oddly short shrift to the urgency of lifting their wages. If the president’s Twitter account is the clearest window into his thinking, it offers at least one piece of evidence that the matter is newly on his mind.

Trump has tweeted about “jobs” 58 times since his November victory; he’s only mentioned wages once, in a parenthetical, a week ago:

It’s not clear how much the issue stands to shape Trump’s political fortunes. Americans’ optimism is surging, according to a recent CNBC poll, with 44 percent believing their wages will rise this year, the second highest such mark in a decade. But Trump’s approval rating continues to drop, falling to 37 percent in that survey. The results suggest if conditions improve, most voters may not be inclined to hand Trump credit.



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Some exciting news over at The Daily 202 from my colleague James Hohmann, whose newsletter makes its debut on Amazon Echo devices and Google Home as a flash briefing called "The Daily 202’s Big Idea." Every morning, you can listen to James analyze one of the day's most important political stories, along with three headlines you need to know. To learn how to add The Daily 202’s Big Idea to your flash briefings on your Echo device or Google Home, visit this page. You can also get the briefing on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

MARKET MOVERS

— Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin pushed back on reports that the Trump administration is considering raising taxes on the rich to pay for middle-class tax breaks.

Following a report from Axios that Trump's chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon is pushing to raise the highest tax bracket to 40 percent, Mnuchin said he's "never heard Steve mention that.” In an interview on ABC’s "This Week" With George Stephanopoulos, Mnuchin called it "another example of a false leak that’s been reported."

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Mnuchin also renewed his pledge to get a tax code overhaul signed into law this year. He said the administration plans to have a "full-blown release" of the tax plan in September.

— In the same interview, Mnuchin demonstrated anew the dangers of going out on a limb for a president who, with a few swipes on his phone, can saw you right off. Asked to defend the president's Sunday morning tweet that he intends to set up a cybersecurity partnership with Russian President Vladimir Putin — a declaration that elicited bipartisan condemnation — Mnuchin fell in line.

"I think this is a very important step forward that what we want to make sure is that we coordinate with Russia, that we're focused on cybersecurity together, that we make sure that they never interfere in any democratic elections or conduct any cybersecurity," Mnuchin said, adding the "strategic alliance" was a "very significant accomplishment for President Trump."

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On Sunday night, Trump appeared to categorically disown the idea, declaring in a tweet that just because he discussed it with Putin "doesn't mean I think it can happen. It can't."

— Trump's switchback is just one of the messes resulting from his G-20 trip, one that left the U.S. looking isolated and diminished. My colleagues Michael Birnbaum and Damien Paletta's final dispatch from the summit concluded that Trump and other leaders wrapped their two days of talks "unable to resolve key differences on core issues such as climate change and globalization, slapping an exclamation point on a divisive summit that left other nations fearing for the future of global alliances in the Trump era."

— Meanwhile, Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., is in hot water after acknowledging Sunday he met last summer with a Kremlin-linked Russian lawyer because she promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton. The June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower was also attended by the then-candidate’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and then-campaign chairman, Paul Manafort.

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Check out this New York Daily News cover:

POCKET CHANGE

— Investors have so far pulled nearly $27 billion from Goldman Sachs Asset Management's mutual funds in 2017, marking Goldman as the worst-selling fund manager in the world, The Financial Times reported. That's almost twice as much as the amount withdrawn from Federated Investors, the second-worst selling fund house. Revenues from Goldman’s asset management division dropped 7 percent in the first quarter of 2017, compared with the previous quarter.

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MONEY ON THE HILL

— Senate Republicans are returning from the recess to face deepening divisions within their own ranks about their Obamacare replacement plan. Some are raising new questions about whether a bill can pass at all, Dave Weigel reports. “My view is it’s probably going to be dead,” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Trump added pressure with a Monday tweet Republicans not to take their August recess without resolving the issue: “I cannot imagine that Congress would dare to leave Washington without a beautiful new HealthCare bill fully approved and ready to go!” Trump wrote.

OPINIONS

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CHART TOPPER

From The Post's Christopher Ingraham: Forget robots — the goats are coming for our jobs

TRUMP TRACKER

— The Treasury Department is considering changes to an Obama-era rule designed to crack down on cross-border corporate tax avoidance, the Wall Street Journal reported. The measure aimed at making it harder for companies to engage in earnings stripping, whereby they piled debt into their U.S. operations to avoid taxes here. It's one of eight tax rules Treasury said it's reconsidering, a move cheered by business interests.

DAYBOOK

Today

The Senate returns from its July Fourth recess today. The House returns on Tuesday.

Coming Up

Tuesday. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs’s conference on central banks is on

The National Economists Club holds an event with Harvard professor Ken Rogoff on Tuesday .

SEC chairman Jay Clayton will speak at the Economic Club of New York’s Wednesday . will speak at the Economic Club of New York’s luncheon on

Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen will Wednesday . will testify before the House Financial Services Committee on

Yellen will also Thursday . will also testify before the Senate Banking Housing and Urban Affairs Committee on

Wednesday . The Center for Strategic and International Studies will hold an event on US global food security strategy on

Wednesday on the US debt. The Heritage Foundation is holding a event onon the US debt.

Wednesday . The House Financial Services Committee will hold a hearing on the Fed’s Supervision and Regulation of the Financial System on

Thursday . The House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Tax Policy will hold a hearing on how tax reform will help small business growth on

Thursday. The House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Securities and Investment will hold a hearing on the “Impact of the DOL Fiduciary Rule on Capital Markets” on

THE FUNNIES

BULL SESSION

Ivanka Trump takes the stage at the G-20 Summit:

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley defended Ivanka Trump's seat at the G-20 table:

Deconstructing Trump's latest Twitter statements on Russia:

The New York Times reported a Russian lawyer promised Donald Trump Jr. info on HIllary Clinton: