Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
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Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
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Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#2Long story short:
The wealth of non rich Americans is almost entirely contained in their highly leveraged houses. If housing prices collapse, their wealth collapses.
In 2008, housing prices collapsed.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#3Long story short: The wealth of non rich Americans is almost entirely contained in their highly leveraged houses. If housing prices collapse, their wealth collapses. In 2008, housing prices collapsed.
Not exactly. The 25th percentile's wealth was dropping even before the recession, which suggests some additional downward pressure, although I am not sure what that could be off the top of my head.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#4This study is misleading, because it uses 'household' wealth, instead of individual wealth, and may be incorrectly interpreted as showing a decline in the middle class, when it is really showing the results of changes in family structure over the past 50 years. This graph shows how this choice affects the results: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g3WZGpDibPM/Up3ZAPRtScI/AAAAAAAAJq...
The following blog-posts go in to more detail:
http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-major-t...
http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-widows-...
http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-men-who...
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#5Project it back a few years, and I'd bet we're poorer on average as a country than we were when I was born. Man, 43% decline for the median? Ouch.
I also like that the mean wealth in America is 6x the median wealth.
Actually, I find the numbers for the 75th+ percentiles a bit surprising, as my mental model had them with significant uptick after about 2011 or so. Kind of a wealth transfer from the lower percentiles. Whereas, this research seems to show that while erosions were smaller for the top (due to their non-real estate growth), no demographic they researched showed overall wealth growth from 2007 on. At best, they've gotten back to zero slope.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#6Long story short: The wealth of non rich Americans is almost entirely contained in their highly leveraged houses. If housing prices collapse, their wealth collapses. In 2008, housing prices collapsed.
Not exactly. The 25th percentile's wealth was dropping even before the recession, which suggests some additional downward pressure, although I am not sure what that could be off the top of my head.
Wage freezes at nominal values which did not keep pace with inflation during the 2000s, I'd guess.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#7It's depressing how 1/4 households basically have no wealth at all.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#8This study is misleading, because it uses 'household' wealth, instead of individual wealth, and may be incorrectly interpreted as showing a decline in the middle class, when it is really showing the results of changes in family structure over the past 50 years. This graph shows how this choice affects the results: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g3WZGpDibPM/Up3ZAPRtScI/AAAAAAAAJq... The following blog-posts go in to more d…
Wow, very interesting that GINI by individual is fairly constant.
However, household GINI is definitely the more relevant figure, as most big economic decisions (where to work, where to live) are made at the household level rather than at the individual level.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#9This study is misleading, because it uses 'household' wealth, instead of individual wealth, and may be incorrectly interpreted as showing a decline in the middle class, when it is really showing the results of changes in family structure over the past 50 years. This graph shows how this choice affects the results: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g3WZGpDibPM/Up3ZAPRtScI/AAAAAAAAJq... The following blog-posts go in to more d…
Wow, very interesting that GINI by individual is fairly constant. However, household GINI is definitely the more relevant figure, as most big economic decisions (where to work, where to live) are made at the household level rather than at the individual level.
But the number of households is strongly influenced by people's personal social decisions such as divorce or living with relatives. Thus the household GINI is strongly influenced by people's personal decisions in addition to their economic circumstances.
More concretely, if I divorce my wife and we become two households does that mean that US economic inequality has increased? I would say not, but the household GINI would say that it has.
Re: Wealth Levels, Wealth Inequality, and the Great Recession [pdf]
#10The wikipedia article on Income inequality in the United States is surprisingly detailed and I highly recommend it if you have any interest on wealth. It's such a polarized topic that the comments almost immediately turn into inaccurate or out of context talking points.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_inequality_in_the_United...