Nearly 80% of U.S. Household Wealth Owned By Millionaires & Billionaires: Federal Reserve Data
Daily Kos, Sept. 28, 2020.
Kenny Stancil at Common Dreams writesAnalysis Shows Nearly 80% of US Household Wealth Owned by Millionaires and Billionaires:
In an analysis of 2019 government data released Monday, policy analyst and blogger Matt Bruenig found that last year, millionaires and billionaires owned 79.2% of all household wealth in the United States despite constituting just under 12% of the population.
Bruenig examined triennial data from the Survey of Consumer Finances, which was released Monday by the U.S. Federal Reserve.
While the share of wealth owned by households with net worths of $1 million or more decreased slightly between 2016 and 2019, it was still much higher than it was in 1989, the year the modern version of the survey began.
Thirty years ago, millionaires and billionaires owned 60.4% of all household wealth in the U.S.
"If we really want to tackle wealth inequality in this country," Bruenig wrote, "it is this wealth that we need to spread around."
Researchers at the People's Policy Project, where Bruenig is president, have proposed doing so through a social wealth fund. [...]
See Graphs,
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/9/28/1981558/-Monday-Night-Owls-Nearly-80-of-U-S-wealth-owned-by-millionaires-and-billionaires
Wealth Inequality, Wiki, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_United_States
dweller
(23,559 posts)makes a great bumper sticker ...
✌🏼
littlemissmartypants
(22,417 posts)BigmanPigman
(51,430 posts)The Dems had better so this when they are in control again. No reaching across the aisle on this or any of the BS they have shoveled on us. No "we take the high road" crap either. We must destroy the GOP once and for all.
amerikat
(4,902 posts)Seems to me that we could get some of those lost souls on our side.
98% on the highest earners seems about right. Ask Bill Gates or Warren buffet and a few others.
BigmanPigman
(51,430 posts)Igel
(35,191 posts)Ways are found around taxes that the population considers too high.
The US has incredible tax compliance rates. Other countries either require much greater social solidarity or much more stringent corralling of the population. As a % of GDP, taxes have been about the same since immediately post war. Every large change in the tax code perturbs the tax collection amounts for a year or two, whether the federal taxes increase or decrease, but then things settle back to about the same amount.
Note that back in the '50s almost everybody paid income tax. Now, it's a majority but not enough to overcome a cloture vote.
Snarkoleptic
(5,995 posts)Roads, bridges, high speed rail, upgraded schools, etc.