Dear Neighbors,
Amid the hourly onslaught of mostly bad to horrific news, it's easy to lose sight of something that's both cause and result of those events.
That's the rapid and enormous transfer of income, wealth and power upward. This newsletter just shows the scale of the wealth and income gaps. How do those gaps affect housing, taxation, spending, health, education, food, war, and more? How do our policies affect those gaps? I'll be writing about that in future newsletters. And we'll examine the urgent question of whether millionaires are fleeing Massachusetts because of the Fair Share Amendment.
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In 2023, the top .1% (1 out of 1000) owned 13.9%of the nation's wealth; the bottom 50% (half of us) together owned 2.6%.
Here's a more detailed set of data and graphics, for the last 14 years, from the Federal Reserve. You can click here, and find out the distribution of wealth by category (e.g. real estate vs.corporate equities and mutual funds) and compare by both levels and shares of the nation's wealth. In the 2 years since the top chart (1998-2023) ended, the top .1% has gained a larger share and the bottom 50% has lost a little.
I do love graphs! Here's another one:
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CBS News reported that census data show Massachusetts' income gap is among the largest in the country. The article includes comments from Mark Martinez, formerly on my staff, now at Mass. Law Reform Institute.
We need to consider inequality in thinking about every issue and every policy and budget proposal. And we need to talk about it publicly, so everyone understands how it affects them.
Stay in touch,
Pat Jehlen