And the irony is that wages in the US have been outperforming inflation since WWII, barring a few rather short periods
I would hardly call 1973 - 2020, which represents 47 years and 63% of the years since the end of WWII, a "rather short period". For the majority of the time, wages have not been outperforming inflation. If they had been, then why have real wages never been higher than they were in 1973?
There was a brief period of a few years in late 1960's when wages peaked after WWII. Other than that, real wages had been rising most of the post-war era. So who is actually picking the years here?
Yes, wages have been rising since 1995, but the doesn't mean anything when you look at the wider picture, as I explained above. If you buy a shitcoin at $1, it drops to $0.10, then rebounds to $0.20, you wouldn't call that a profit. When real wages fell from $23.00 to $18.50, then rebounded to $22.00, you wouldn't call that an overall rise.