An unbalanced society

An unbalanced society There is (unsurprisingly) very little data about the distribution of wealth in America. There is one source, the Survey of Consumer Finances", sponsored by the Federal Reserve Board, that does provide data starting from 1983. You can represent the wealth distribution in various ways - the data stays the same. Illustration 3 demonstrates that there is an extreme division between haves, and have-nots. These data sugest that wealth is concentrated in the hands of a small number of families. The wealthiest 1 percent of families owns roughly 34.3% of the nation's net worth, the top 10% of families owns over 71%, and the bottom 40% of the population owns way less than 1%. Illustration 1 shows a more precise breakdown of the wealth distribution - and helps make the wealth it look'more distributed: "sttp:/www.federaleervagonipubalonn/omaschndeml Illustration 2 shows that the top 10% alone own three thirds of the wealth between them. Leaving just under 30% of the wealth between the remaining 90%. Top 40 own 95.9% Top 10% own 71.2% llustration 35 Illustration 35 Kilustration 30 Top 1% own 34.3% 30 30 25 25 Next 30% own 24.7% 20 20 20 Bottom 40% own 0.2% 15 15 15 Remaining 60% own 4% 60 80 100 20 40 60 80 100 40 60 80 100 % % OF POPULATION OF POPULATION OF POPULATION Designed by http://www.efekt.net · 2010 · Data source 2004: http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm OF WEALTH OF WEALTH | OF WEALTH