Manufacturing-industry unions and employers are negotiating wage increases larger than anything we’ve seen since the recession. Employees covered under these contracts are receiving pay hikes that are double what they were receiving at this time last year.

Through Oct. 1, the average first-year wage increase bargained in manufacturing contracts this year has been 2.3 percent. That’s the highest average wage hike for manufacturing unions at the third-quarter mark since 2008 (2.5 percent).

In that quarter, of course, wages had already begun their tumble from pre-recession highs. Just one year earlier, in 2007, manufacturing contracts were promising average first-year wage hikes of 3.2 percent after three quarters. Wages bottomed out in 2010, when, through the third quarter, increases averaged only 1.3 percent. In 2011, wages increased an average 1.8 percent at the third-quarter mark.

The 2012 improvement is even more pronounced when you consider the sizes of the bargaining units covered under these contracts. By counting the number of employees receiving the wage hikes, instead of the number of contracts providing them (better known as computing the “weighted average”), we find that first-year wage hikes at the third-quarter mark this year are double what they were last year: 2.2 percent to 1.1 percent. That’s the biggest year-to-year boost since 2008-2009.

Lump sum bonuses can sometimes skew results in manufacturing, as I’ve mentioned before. But even when lump sums are factored in, the results stay the same: the average increase through Oct. 1 this year is 3.5 percent, the highest three-quarter average since 2008 (3.8 percent).

And it’s not just first-year wages that have rebounded. Average second- and third-year wage increases through three quarters of 2012 stand at 2.5 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively. That’s higher than anything we’ve seen since the third quarter of 2008 (2.8 percent for both).