A SECOND GILDED AGE

The increase in wealth for the richest members of our society is astounding. I noted below that we now exceed the highest level seen in the last century and the CBPP has more on this trend. This table gives some sense of who was really helped by the Bush tax cuts.

Table 1: Average Income Gains, Adjusted for Inflation, 2002-2007
	Dollar Increase	Percent Increase	Average Annual Increase
Bottom 90 Percent	$1,206	3.9%	0.8%
Next 9 Percent	$19,476	13.0%	2.5%
Top 1 Percent	$521,127	61.8%	10.1%
Top 0.1 Percent	$3,455,384	94.1%	14.2%
Note : In 2007, the bottom 90 percent of households were those with incomes below about $110,000. The next 9 percent were those with incomes between $110,000 and about $400,000, and the top 0.1 percent were those with incomes above about $2,000,000. Calculations are in current 2007 dollars.