say, the top decile, or 10%, of the income distribution.
This stratum is not only prospering economically. For the people on this top rung, education levels are high and rising. Families are planned, marriages strong, neighborhoods safe and rich in social capital, networks plentiful, BMIs low and savings rates high.
Below these are what Reeves calls “the squeezed middle” and then the “entrenched poor. Reeves later writes,
Data recently unveiled by my colleague Gary Burtless, showing income growth since 1979 across the distribution, shows that in terms of after-tax income, those at the top have done really well since 1979; that’s perhaps not a surprise. What might be more instructive is the relative performance of the lowest quintile and the middle – ie. a 49% rise compared to a 36% rise. Income growth has clearly been weakest in the middle of the distribution.
Pointer from James Pethokoukis.