On Sep 1, 2006, at 4:17 PM, mike larkin wrote:
> http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/
> 2006_09/009435.php
>
>
> "....Part of the problem is that Democrats have been
> misled about the state of the middle class.
> Progressive economists typically peg median household
> income at about $45,000. But that includes households
> headed by 22-year olds (who are on their way up) and
> 76-year olds (who live on fixed incomes that may be
> small but are often comfortable since they have no
> dependents and limited work related expenses).
>
> Among households headed by prime age Americans —
> adults between the ages of 26 and 59 — the median
> household income is about $63,000. For prime age
> married households the median income is over $70,000,
> and it is nearly $80,000 for two-earner prime age
> households. The point is that Democrats have a view of
> the middle class that is at one place on the income
> spectrum, when the reality is in a very different
> place.
>
> This is a badly underappreciated point: America is a
> very rich country.
With one in eight officially poor - and by a more reasonable standard of poverty, one in four or five.
This quoted bit is an exercise in cherry picking, to make things look a lot better than they are. Half of those polled by Gallup say they're worried about paying medical bills, 60% worry about not having enough in retirement, almost 40% worry about paying their bills. Only 57% of households are "prime age"; only 51% are married- couple; only 42% of households have two earners or more. The canned Census tables don't say how many meet all these characteristics, but they're probably no more than a third. 38% of households have incomes under $35,000; just 26% have incomes of $80,000 or more. And that's in a given year - U.S. society is very volatile, and today's $80k household could easily be next year's $40k.
It's not "progressive economists" who peg median household income at $45,000 - it's the damned Census Bureau. $46,326, to be precise.
Doug