Tammy

“It is evident that wealth is even more unevenly distributed than income and
that the gap is widening. Since 1976, wealth has increased by 63 percent for the
wealthiest 1 percent of the population and by 71 percent for the top 20 percent.
Wealth has decreased by 43 percent for the bottom 40 percent of the U.S. population (Economic Policy Institute 2011). The widening gap has multiple causes.
First, shifts in the U.S. tax code have lowered the top tax rate from 91 percent
in the years from 1950 to 1963, to 35 percent from 2003 to 2012, allowing the
wealthy to retain far more of their income (Tax Policy Center 2012). Second,
wages for most U.S. families have stagnated since the early 1970s. Moreover,
credit card, education, and mortgage debt have skyrocketed. Finally, the collapse
of the housing market beginning in 2007 dramatically affected many middleclass families who held a significant portion of their wealth in the value of their
home. By 2012, fully 31 percent of all homeowners owed more on their mortgages than their homes were worth (Zillow 2012).”
― Kenneth J Guest, Cultural Anthropology: A Toolkit for a Global Age

“In another surprising statistic about the transfer of wealth from generation to
generation, only 1.6 percent of Americans receive $100,000 or more in inheritance.
Another 1.1 percent receives $50,000 to $100,000. The rest of the population —
97.3 percent — receives no inheritance whatsoever”
― Kenneth J Guest, Cultural Anthropology: A Toolkit for a Global Age

“For need can blossom into all the compensation it requires. To crave and to have are as like as a thing and its shadow. For when does a berry break upon the tongue as sweetly as when one longs to taste it, and when is the taste refracted into so many hues and savors of ripeness and earth, and when do our senses know any thing so utterly as when we lack it? And here again is a foreshadowing-the world will be made whole. For to wish for a hand on one's hair is all but to feel it. So whatever we may lose, very craving gives it back to us again. Though we dream and hardly know it, longing, like an angel, fosters us, smooths our hair, and brings us wild strawberries.”
― Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping

“Percentage of
Population*
Percentage of
Private Wealth
Number of
People
Top 1% of Population 35.6% 3,000,000 people
Next 19% of Population 51.6% 57,000,000 people
Bottom 80% of Population 12.8% 240,000,000 people”
― Kenneth J Guest, Cultural Anthropology: A Toolkit for a Global Age