In the upcoming months, no significant changes are expected regarding the pace of annual wage growth, according to the preliminary fourth-quarter Wage Trend Indicator released by Bloomberg BNA, a publisher of specialized news and information.

The index took a slip dip from 98.52 to 98.47 in the third quarter. If this figure is confirmed in the revised and final fourth-quarter readings, it would mark the second consecutive drop. The index has barely moved between 98.40 and 98.67 over the last five quarters.

"The latest WTI suggests that wage growth is still in a holding pattern," says economist Kathryn Kobe, a consultant who maintains and helped develop Bloomberg BNA's WTI database. "The labor market has been moving in the right direction, but there is a lot of uncertainty over efforts to avoid the fiscal cliff, which would send the economy into a tailspin."