Category Archives: Income

Blog: Washington Post Highlights Wealth and Income Disparities

Washington Post Highlights Wealth and Income Disparities

By Stephanie Niedringhaus
June 20, 2011

The front page of Sunday’s Washington Post (6/19/11) featured another chilling article about growing disparities in our nation. Under the heading, “Breakaway Wealth; The Pay Bubble,” one article (“Income gap widens as executives prosper”) included information about how executive compensation rose sharply in recent years while the wealth gap also grew dramatically. During the 1950s and 1960s, it noted, executive pay was relative flat. The steep rise began in the 1970s.

The fact that executive pay was flat when companies were growing in the ‘50s and ‘60s shows that current excuses for excessive compensation – i.e., that executive salaries rise naturally when firms grow – are inaccurate.

Many of today’s executives enjoy luxurious lifestyles while millions of people struggle to put food on the table. According to the article, “The evolution of executive grandeur – from very comfortable to jet-setting – reflects one of the primary reasons that the gap between those with the highest incomes and everyone else is widening.”

Do you want to learn more? Check out the Washington Post.

And be sure to sign up for our Mind the Gap! campaign by clicking here. You can be part of the movement to address this injustice!

Blog: Race, Wealth, and Intergenerational Poverty

Blog: Race, Wealth, and Intergenerational Poverty

Page May
Jun 10, 2011

Blog: Race, Wealth, and Intergenerational Poverty

Article: There will never be a post-racial America if the wealth gap persists.

From The American Prospect-

“Since the election of Barack Obama, a growing belief has emerged that race is no longer a defining feature of one’s life chances. But the extraordinary overlap between wealth and race puts a lie to the notion that America is now in a post-racial era. The smallest racial wealth gap exists for families in the third quartile of the income distribution where the typical black family has only 38 percent of the wealth of the typical white family. In the bottom income quartile—the group containing the working poor—a black family has a startlingly low 2 percent of the wealth of the typical white family.

Given the importance of intergenerational transfers of wealth and past and present barriers preventing black wealth accumulation, private action and market forces alone cannot close an unjust racial wealth gap—public-sector intervention is necessary…However, wealth, given the racial disparity of its distribution, can be an effective non-race-based instrument to eliminate racial inequality. We could shift from an income-based to a wealth-based test for transfer programs. Policy eligibility based on net worth below the national median would qualify a large proportion of black households…. These changes in eligibility should be coupled with policies to promote asset building.”

Read more here.