Report on Inequality Finds 3 Richest Americans Wealthier Than Bottom Half

The New York Stock Exchange. (photo: Ben Hider/NYSE Euronext)

By The Wisconsin Gazette

11 November 17

readersupportednews.org

 

disproportionate share of America’s income and wealth gains has flowed to the top of the economic spectrum, confirms a report from the progressive Institute for PolicyStudies. Americans at the other end of our economic spectrum, meanwhile, watch their wages stagnate and savings dwindle. 

The report, Billionaire Bonanza, shows the extreme wealth concentrated within the fortunes of the 400 wealthiest Americans.

The report draws on data from the Forbes 400 and the Federal Reserve’s 2016 Survey of Consumer Finances.

Here are some key findings:

• The three wealthiest people in the United States — Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and Warren Buffett — own more wealth than the entire bottom half of the American population combined, a total of 160 million people or 63 million households.


• America’s top 25 billionaires together hold $1 trillion in wealth. They have as much wealth as 56 percent of the population, a total 178 million people or 70 million households.


• The billionaires who make up the full Forbes 400 list own more wealth than the bottom 64 percent of the U.S. population, an estimated 80 million households or 204 million people.


• The median American family has a net worth of $80,000, excluding the family car. The Forbes 400 own more wealth than 33 million of these typical American families.


• One in five U.S households has zero or negative net worth. “Underwater households” make up an even higher share of households of color. More than 30 percent of black households and 27 percent of Latino households have zero or negative net worth to fall back on.

The figures underestimate current levels of wealth concentration. The growing use of offshore tax havens and legal trusts has made the concealing of assets more widespread than ever before.To reduce extreme wealth inequality in the United States we need to take two key steps:

To reduce extreme wealth inequality in the United States, the policy center says:

• "We must not make inequality worse through new tax cuts for the wealthy. The proposed Trump tax cuts, as currently designed, would grow top 1 percent fortunes and do little to reduce the ranks of America’s underwater nation."


• "We need to implement policies to reduce concentrated wealth. Inequality will continue to widen unless we intervene directly to reduce grand concentrations of private wealth. By taxing our wealthiest households, we could raise significant revenues and then invest these funds to expand wealth-building opportunities across the economy. We could also broaden the distribution of America’s wealth by encouraging employee ownership, matching savings programs and similar initiatives."