The land of unlimited inequality

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/jun2011/pers-j23.shtml

The United States is well on its way to becoming the most unequal society on the planet. An extensive economic analysis of the growing gap between the wealthy and everyone else, summarized in last Sunday’s Washington Post, provides striking evidence of this trend.

The study, titled, “Jobs and Income Growth of Top Earners and the Causes of Changing Income Inequality: Evidence from U.S. Tax Return Data,” was conducted by two academic economists, Jon Bakija of Williams College and Bradley Heim of Indiana University, together with Adam Cole of the Office of Tax Analysis at the US Department of Treasury.

While the study is highly technical and written in economic jargon, the facts that it uncovers are socially and politically explosive. The researchers analyzed the data provided by the tax returns of the top one-tenth of one percent of all US income earners, about 140,000 people whose average income was $1.7 million annually, and examined the trends in the income share of this most privileged section of the population over the past 35 years.

They discovered that while media attention is devoted to the handful of celebrity entertainers and athletes who make seven and eight-figure incomes, the bulk of the top income earners, more than 60 percent, were executives, managers and supervisors of financial and non-financial companies. Another 11 percent were lawyers and real estate moguls. Only 3 percent were celebrities.

More at the link --