On Tue, 06 Aug 2013 17:16:45 +0100, scott wrote:

>> Between 1967 and 2003 here in the US, according to the US Census
>> Bureau, people in the bottom 20% of incomes have seen their incomes
>> raise an average of 28.4%. ($14,002 at the start and $17,984 in 2003)
>>
>> At the same time, people in the 95th percentile have seen their average
>> incomes go up by about 78%. ($88,678 in '67, $154,120 in '03).
> 
> I was looking at figures globally, not just for one country. There must
> be reasons why the USA increases for the bottom 20% have not kept up
> with the global trend.

If I'm not mistaken, Patrick was talking about US numbers, so the 
comparison started out with an apples/oranges basis to start with.

>> I'm talking in the US, and those values don't appear to take inflation
>> into account, it seems.
> 
> They all take inflation into account.

All I saw were graphs in your citations, no notes on the data behind 
those, so I'll have to ask for links to those data sources.

>  > But those graphs also don't provide sources for
>> their data, so they don't seem to be particularly useful.  I can create
>> a graph that tells whatever story I want if I don't tell you the source
>> of the data.
> 
> You can try googling "global income distribution", the answers are all
> the same.

I want to know specifically what you're citing. :)

> Try pages 34 and 35 (pages 35 and 36 in the PDF) of this report.
> 
> http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/globalincometrends.pdf

Thank you.  I'll look at it when I have a few minutes.

> The table "Income growth by decile" holds the key data. Essentially the
> low-mid earners have seen the largest growth, with the very lowest and
> high earners seeing lower growth (but still significantly positive). The
> only real negative growth (in real terms) was for those in the 75-85
> percentile from 1990-2000. In the same period the bottom 10% saw 12%
> growth.

Again, though, growth factors are not the same as widening gaps in income 
disparity.  Someone who made $250K back in 1990 who makes $500K now has 
not had to deal with being part of the lower income class.  They've not 
had to make decisions between health care, food, housing, and clothes.

Someone who made $6,000 back then and makes even $20,000 now does have to 
evaluate those kinds of decisions, because they're below the poverty line.

Jim

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