![]() workers earned all of last year.” 6 Factors Driving Perceptions of an Economic Divide ![]() 5 More sensationally, recently reported on a study showing that “top private-equity and hedge fund managers made more in 10 minutes than average-paid U.S. ![]() Recently released Census Bureau data show that in 2006, median household income adjusted for inflation was still 2.1% below its 1999 level. Meanwhile, Congressional Budget Office data 4 show that despite the increase in the number of families with two or more earners and widespread income gains in the latter half of the 1990s, families in the middle fifth of the income distribution realized only a modest $6,600 increase in annual income between 19, while the top 1% of families saw their incomes rise from $839,100 to an average $1,259,700. 2 (For a review of other recent studies see an earlier Pew commentary, “ Pinched Pocketbooks: Do Average Americans Spot Something That Most Economists Miss?“ 3) income trends, 1 economists Piketty and Saez compute that the share of income going to families in the top 1% of the income scale has doubled from 8% in 1980 to 16% in 2004 even excluding capital gains. For example, in an update of their earlier study of long-term U.S. As numerous studies have demonstrated in recent years, income gains over the last few decades have been heavily concentrated at the very top of the income distribution. The increased prevalence of both views - that the country is increasingly divided along economic lines and that a given individual is on the wrong side of that divide - finds support in national economic data. The share of Americans who see the country as divided along economic lines has also continued to tick upward, though at a somewhat slower rate in recent years (Have/have-not perceptions rose by 18 points over the 13 years between 19 compared with a rise of four points over the last six years). Since then the number of self-described “haves” has fallen by seven percentage points, a decline as large as that which occurred over the previous 13 years. As recently as 2001, a 52%-majority still viewed themselves as resting on the positive side of the economic balance, compared with 32% who felt they were monetarily in need. These shifting attitudes have occurred gradually over the past two decades, although the perception of personal financial stringency appears to have risen more rapidly in recent years.
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