Remember, wages account for two-thirds of the cost of producing a product.

Since wages and benefits account for half the city's budget, Mr. Giuliani must stand firm against any further concessions to employees.

He said 52,000 state employees' wages and benefits account for a third of the state's $13.2 billion budget.

Their wages are critical to the territories, accounting for one-third of their economy, whose value has been put by Israeli officials at $3 billion a year.

The balance sheet showed expenditure of £4,158, of which players' wages, bonuses and transfer fees accounted for £2,536.

Changing wages, by contrast, accounted for less than 6 percent of the increase in the gap.

Of the 609 employed residents over the age 16, private-sector wage and salary workers accounted for 475 of them (78.0%).

The low wages account for the frequency of double jobs, church and synagogue.

Since wages account for about two-thirds of business costs, a labor shortage can quickly raise the general price level.

But he and other analysts noted that while wages accounted for 70 percent or so of a product's cost, materials prices contributed less than 30 percent.