Re: Why Thomas Frank is Wrong
On Sep 1, 2006, at 4:17 PM, mike larkin wrote:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/ 2006_09/009435.php
“….Part of the problem is that Democrats have been misled about the state of the middle class. Progressive economists typically peg median household income at about $45,000. But that includes households headed by 22-year olds (who are on their way up) and 76-year olds (who live on fixed incomes that may be small but are often comfortable since they have no dependents and limited work related expenses).
Among households headed by prime age Americans —adults between the ages of 26 and 59 — the median household income is about $63,000. For prime age married households the median income is over $70,000, and it is nearly $80,000 for two-earner prime age households. The point is that Democrats have a view of the middle class that is at one place on the income spectrum, when the reality is in a very different place.
This is a badly underappreciated point: America is a very rich country.
With one in eight officially poor - and by a more reasonable standard
of poverty, one in four or five.
This quoted bit is an exercise in cherry picking, to make things look
a lot better than they are. Half of those polled by Gallup say
they’re worried about paying medical bills, 60% worry about not
having enough in retirement, almost 40% worry about paying their
bills. Only 57% of households are “prime age”; only 51% are married-
couple; only 42% of households have two earners or more. The canned
Census tables don’t say how many meet all these characteristics, but
they’re probably no more than a third. 38% of households have incomes
under $35,000; just 26% have incomes of $80,000 or more. And that’s
in a given year - U.S. society is very volatile, and today’s $80k
household could easily be next year’s $40k.
It’s not “progressive economists” who peg median household income at
$45,000 - it’s the damned Census Bureau. $46,326, to be precise.
Doug