I stumbled across a webpage, created by William Domhoff of UCSC, which contains some fascinating data on income distribution and wealth distribution, or, if you prefer, income concentration and wealth concentration.
I've posted the wealth concentration data separately; here, I'll focus on the concentration of income. Table 6 draws on work of Edward Wolff, of NYU, not yet published.
| Income Distribution, 1982 and 2006 |
|||
| 1982 |
2006 | Change |
|
| Top 1%: | 12.8% | 21.3% |
+8.5 points |
| Next 19%: |
39.1% | 40.1% |
+1.0 points |
| Bottom 80%: | 48.1% | 38.6% |
-9.5 points |
Turning to Capital Income -- by which I assume they mean income derived not from wages but from other sources, which includes that which the classical economists called land, and which the neoclassical economists subsume under "capital" as if they were identical:
| 1979 |
2003 |
|||||
| Top 1% | 37.8% |
57.5% |
+19.7 percentage points |
|||
| Next 4% |
20.1% |
15.7% |
-4.4 percentage points |
|||
| Next 5% |
8.8% |
6.2% |
-2.6 percentage points | |||
| Next 10% |
10.2% |
8.0% |
-2.2 percentage points |
|||
| Bottom 80% |
23.1% |
12.6% |
-10.5 percentage points |
Is this something we're proud of, or think we ought to be exporting to other countries? Is it consistent with our ideals, about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness being the right of every American, of every person on earth?
We're permitting the privatization of things which rightly belong to the commons -- to all of us. What things? The value of natural resources flows into whose pockets? The annual value of urban land flows into whose pockets? The value of water rights flows into whose pockets? The value of the airwaves flows into whose pockets? (Hint: look at the distribution of capital income!) The value of 8am landing rights at LaGuardia flows into whose pockets? The value of geosynchronous orbits so necessary to certain businesses and systems flows into whose pockets? The bottom 80% of us? The next 19% of us? The top 1%? The owners of so-called "small" businesses?
These are privileges. Structures which divert to individuals and corporations things which all of us create. They reap what we together sow, and then we are led to respect them as "self-made men" and success stories.
They are not eternal. They are not immutable. Each can be reformed, and each can provide a significant revenue source to meet our communities' need for revenue for common purposes. Collecting this revenue this way will not damage our economy as our current tax structure does. It will, however, lighten the portfolios of some who are used to considering themselves blessed by our current way of doing things -- those born on 3rd base who think they hit a home run. And create some opportunities for those who want to works, and for those who want to be compensated for their work with wages which begin to line up better to the cost of living.
There IS enough to go around. Not enough for all of us to live like the top 1%, perhaps, but certainly enough for many more of us to live at the sort of level we call middle class, and even at the, say, 70th percentile -- without despoiling the earth.
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