U.S. sees biggest wealth gap since the Roaring '20s
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"The 400 richest Americans — the top 0.00025 percent of the population — have tripled their share of the nation’s wealth since the early 1980s, according to a new <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="working paper" data-vars-click-url="http://papers.nber.org/tmp/38195-w25462.pdf" data-vars-content-id="938b8a27-bf7b-4392-b4ae-41b84bef2002" data-vars-headline="U.S. sees biggest wealth gap since the Roaring '20s" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="http://papers.nber.org/tmp/38195-w25462.pdf" target="_blank">working paper</a> on wealth inequality by University of California at Berkeley economist Gabriel Zucman," the WashPost's Christopher <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="Ingraham" data-vars-click-url="https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/christopher-ingraham/" data-vars-content-id="938b8a27-bf7b-4392-b4ae-41b84bef2002" data-vars-headline="U.S. sees biggest wealth gap since the Roaring '20s" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/christopher-ingraham/" target="_blank">Ingraham</a> <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="reports" data-vars-click-url="https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2019/02/08/wealth-concentration-returning-levels-last-seen-during-roaring-twenties-according-new-research/?utm_term=.330faf2607ed" data-vars-content-id="938b8a27-bf7b-4392-b4ae-41b84bef2002" data-vars-headline="U.S. sees biggest wealth gap since the Roaring '20s" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2019/02/08/wealth-concentration-returning-levels-last-seen-during-roaring-twenties-according-new-research/?utm_term=.330faf2607ed" target="_blank">reports</a>.
<strong>By the numbers: </strong>Those 400 Americans own more than the 150 million adults in the bottom 60% of the wealth distribution. According to the <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="World Inequality Database" data-vars-click-url="https://wid.world/country/usa/" data-vars-content-id="938b8a27-bf7b-4392-b4ae-41b84bef2002" data-vars-headline="U.S. sees biggest wealth gap since the Roaring '20s" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://wid.world/country/usa/" target="_blank">World Inequality Database</a> maintained by Zucman and others, the bottom 60% saw their share of the nation’s wealth fall from 5.7% in 1987 to 2.1% in 2014. Zucman, who advised Elizabeth Warren on her wealth tax, finds that "U.S. wealth concentration seems to have returned to levels last seen during the Roaring Twenties."
