February 2, 2000
Gap between rich and
poor growing wider
___WASHINGTON (ABP)--The booming U.S. economy has benefited the middle class but widened the gap between the country's haves and have-nots, according to two recent reports.
___A private study released Jan. 18 showed the earning gap between the richest and poorest Americans widened in the 1990s. Income for the richest 20 percent of Americans rose 15 percent in 10 years. Earnings at the bottom fifth of wage earners, meanwhile, grew less than 1 percent, according to the study by the Economic Policy Institute and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
___The U.S. Federal Reserve released a separate study showing changes in net worth, the difference between a person's total assets and total liabilities.
___The federal study found Americans' net worth grew strongly between 1995 and 1998, with mean net worth rising 25.7 percent and the median 17.6 percent. The strongest gains came for those with incomes of $100,000 or more, a group likely to have made large gains in the stock market.
___Groups with the lowest incomes, however, lost ground despite America's economic boom. The median net worth dropped 25 percent for those earning less than $10,000, while the mean declined 14 percent.
___At the other end of the spectrum, those earning $100,000 or more, the mean net worth rose 22 percent, while the median fell slightly. The study said the difference between the median (midpoint) and mean (average) indicates "a widening dispersion of net worth among families in this group."
___America's middle class, meanwhile, also gained. The median net worth for those earning between $25,000 and $49,999 grew 6 percent, to $60,300. For those earning between $50,000 and less than $100,000, it rose 20 percent, to $152,000.
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