The Rigid Class Structure in the US

Oh yes, the rigid class structure in the U.S. that is based on income. Dr. Mark Rank followed a number of Americans [ages 25 to 60] over a 44 year period to determine how rigid the class structure is. Here is what they found. 

"It turns out that 12% of the population will find themselves in the top 1% of the income distribution for at least one year. What’s more, 39% of Americans will spend a year in the top 5% of the income distribution, 56% will find themselves in the top 10%, and a whopping 73% will spend a year in the top 20% of the income distribution."

"Yet while many Americans will experience some level of affluence during their lives, a much smaller percentage of them will do so for an extended period of time. Although 12% of the population will experience a year in which they find themselves in the top 1% of the income distribution, a mere 0.6% will do so in 10 consecutive years."

"It is clear that the image of a static 1 and 99 percent is largely incorrect. The majority of Americans will experience at least one year of affluence at some point during their working careers. "

So it appears that the United States is a land of opportunity and that this is a land where a large majority of people will experience both wealth or poverty at some point in their life.

As Thomas Sowell has been trying to tell us for years now "Alarmists are not talking about real flesh and blood people. They are talking about abstract categories like the top or bottom 10 percent or 20 percent of families or households. So long as all incomes are not identical, there will always be top and bottom 10 percents or 20 percents or any other percents. But these abstract categories do not contain the same people over time."

Jerry