At 05:14 PM 1/19/02 -0600 Dan Minette wrote:
>Lets look at the average income of the bottom 40%. This clearly includes
>not just the unemployed, but a lot of working people too. This income
>gained 6% from 70 to 80, and the same from 80 to 90. But, in both cases,
>the following recession wiped out half of the gain. So, the overall gain
>from 70 to 93 was only 7%.
>
>But, if you look at the top 5%, a very interesting thing occurred. The top
>5% gained 13% from '70 to '80. It then gained another 4.5% from '80 to '83.
>While the bottom 40% lost half of their gains, the top 5% kept on gaining
>income at the same rate. Indeed, the overall gain for the top 5% was 54%
>from 80 to 93. (For completeness, the income of the middle 20% rose 4%, the
>income of the 4th quintile rose 10% and the income of the top quintile rose
>30% during that time.)
>
>Given all this, how in the world would you expect poverty to decease over
>that period?
Ummm...... because we spent billions upon billions of dollars on it?
>It ignores the fact that the boom of the '90s was
>responsible for the decrease in poverty.
Yeah, looks to me like economic growth is good for the poor, whereas
economic recessions are positively devastating for the poor.
JDG
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John D. Giorgis - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - ICQ #3527685
"Our campaign against international terrorism does not represent some
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