The top 2-5 percent have increased their inflation-adjusted wealth by 75 percent from 1983 to 2009 while average wealth went down for 80 percent of American households.
The rest of the top 20 percent have been prosperous, realizing a 32 percent gain in inflation-adjusted wealth since 1983.
The average household net worth for the top 1 percent in 2009 was almost $14 million, while the average household net worth for the bottom 47 percent was almost ZERO.
For nearly half of America, average debt is about the same as average asset ownership.
The richest 300 persons on earth (about a third of them in the U.S.) have more money than the poorest 3 billion people.
Out of all developed and undeveloped countries with at least a quarter-million adults, the U.S. has the fourth-highest degree of wealth inequality in the world, trailing only Russia, Ukraine and Lebanon.
The richest 10 percent own almost 90 percent of stocks excluding pensions.
The world’s wealth has doubled in 10 years, from $113 trillion to $223 trillion, and is expected to reach $330 trillion by 2017. The financial industry has figured out how to double or triple its buying power while most of the world has proportionately less.
Barclays reported that those with earnings in the top 20 percent donated on average 1.3 percent of their income, whereas those in the bottom 20 percent donated 3.2 percent.
Households earning less than $25,000 a year gave away an average of 4.2 percent of their incomes, while those with earnings of more than $75,000 gave away 2.7 percent.
India just approved a program to spend $4 billion a year to feed 800 million people. Half of Indian children under 5 are malnourished. In 2012, three members of the Walton family each made over $4 billion just from stocks and other investments. So did Charles Koch, and David Koch, and Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett, and Larry Ellison, and Michael Bloomberg, and Jeff Bezos.
The 400 richest Americans made $200 billion in just one year. That’s equivalent to the combined total of the federal food stamp, education and housing budgets.
About two-thirds of nearly $1 trillion in individual tax subsidies from special deductions, exemptions, exclusions, credits, capital gains and loopholes goes to the top quintile of taxpayers. 75 percent of dividend and capital gain subsidies go to the richest 1 percent.
