In 2005, total reported income in the United States rose over the previous year by almost 9 percent. Pretty good, huh? Actually, it depends on who you are. A new study of tax data from the Internal Revenue Service shows that, now more than ever, the old adage is true: the rich get richer while the poor get poorer. As reported in The New York Times, the research found that those making the top 1 percent of income, $348,000 or more per year, saw an increase in earnings of 14 percent in 2005. That compares with Americans in the bottom 90 percent of the income ladder, whose earnings slipped by 0.6 percent.

The numbers get worse the more closely you look, and together they paint a troubling picture of a growing income gap in the United States. The study, done by economist Emmanuel Saez at the University of California at Berkeley with Thomas Piketty at the Paris School of Economics, found that the top 1 percent of earners collectively held in 2005 the largest share of the nation's total income in eight decades -- 21.8 percent.

Only a year earlier, the top 1 percent had 19.8 percent of all income. To see when the rich copped its largest chunk of the nation's income, 23.9 percent, you'd have to go back to 1928, during the Calvin Coolidge administration. Is anyone really surprised that, after six years of economic policy under George W. Bush, America's rich have done almost as well?

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07099/776331-192.stm


The economy is great! If you're in the top 1%. That's a fabulous legacy, George. You made the rich richer.

Also, the median income has been stagnant since Bush has been in office.

What's interesting is that the people trying to con us into believing that the economy is so wonderful quote the "average income" statistics. Average income in the country has risen substatially--I think the last figures I saw were that the average family or individual (I can't remember which) income in the U.S. is somewhere around $75 or $80,000. But it is the median income that really tells the truth. That is somewhere around $45,000, I believe (my figures may be outdated and/or inaccurate, but I think my proportions are about right). This means that a very few are making a whole lot more than everyone else, bringing up that average. But it also means that about half the families or individuals are making less than the mid $40's in income. Talk about disparity! Ideally, the median and the average should not be all that far apart....