Several years ago, Senators Max Baucus and Charles Grassley asked the Congressional Budget Office to whip up an analysis of income inequality in America. It took awhile to piece together, but the report’s now out, and the picture’s quite stark. The incomes of the wealthiest 1 percent have nearly tripled since 1979. Everyone else? Not so much.
The chart on the right sets the scene. The after-tax incomes of the middle class (the 21st to 80th percentiles) have grown at about 1 percent per year since 1979, adjusting for inflation. The incomes of the wealthies 1 percent, meanwhile, have zoomed upward at a consderably faster pace.
via The CBO takes on income inequality – The Washington Post.