PAGE
7EMPLOYEES WHO GOT A PAY
RAISE IN THE PAST YEAREMPLOYEES WHO GOT A
BETTER-PAYING JOBEMPLOYEES WHO GOT BOTHEMPLOYEES WHO GOT NEITHER27%6%5%62%
SOURCE: BANKRATE14
FORTUNE.COM// JA N.1.
BABIES ONE BLUE-COLORED SPARKis all
it took. After off-duty Border
Patrol agent Dennis Dickey fired his gun at a
package of colored explosives, grasses and
shrubs lit up, and flames spread across a
mountainside in southern Arizona. The
Sawmill Fire, which began April 23, 2017,
scorched 45,000 acres of land, costing more
than $8 million in damage and firefighting.
Dickey was partaking in the recent trend of
grand “gender reveal” stunts, where expectant
parents learn the gender of their baby. What
Revealing Leaves
Us Reeling
In the age of Instagram, baby showers get
taken to the next level.
By Daniel Bentley & Lucas LaursenMOST
AMERICANS
AREN’T
GET TING
RAISESstarted off as parties in-
volving a cake with a blue
or pink filling or balloons
filled with colored confetti
has grown increasingly
elaborate and expensive.
One Australian company
even makes a $100 car
tire that gives off colored
smoke when doing a
burnout.
The parties have their
critics, but that hasn’t
diminished demand. On
craft marketplace Etsy,
there were over 3.6 mil-
lion searches for gender-
reveal decorations in
2018, a 59% increase over
the prior year. What does
that reveal about us?It’s a girl! A Marine
captain punts a football
filled with pink powder.
MONEY
DESPITE A TAX PLAN
promising a new era of
prosperity for the middle
class, a new poll from
personal finance site
Bankrate suggests Ameri-
cans are having trouble
getting raises. In a survey
conducted in November of
1,000 American workers,
Bankrate found that 62%
hadn’t received a pay raise
in their current jobs in the
past 12 months. Just 27%
of Americans received a
raise in their current jobs,
and 6% moved to another
job to increase their earn-
ings. The findings were
sobering when combined
with the prior year, when
52% of Americans said
they hadn’t received a pay
raise in the past year.
Despite the majority
of Americans experienc-
ing stagnating wages,
they’re not necessarily
frustrated, says the study.
Ninety-one percent of re-
spondents told Bankrate
that they have the “same
or greater confidence” in
the job market this year as
they had in the previous
year.—DON REISINGERABFORCESNEWSCOLLECTION/ALAMY