Inequality in the United States is a Civil Rights Problem

The increasing difference in income in the United States is linked inextricably to inequities in the opportunities for youth, poor health and especially lack of access to education that I find unacceptable. As my last post indicated, there is good evidence that these changes are not simply "the way things are", but are significantly the result of government policies that in turn came from the influence of money on policy.

Source: Congressional Budget Office

 For the 1 percent of the population with the highest income, average real after-tax household income grew by 275 percent between 1979 and 2007
 For others in the 20 percent of the population with the highest income (those in the 81st through 99th
percentiles), average real after-tax household income grew by 65 percent over that period, much faster than it did for the remaining 80 percent of the population, but not nearly as fast as for the top 1 percent.
 For the 60 percent of the population in the middle of the income scale (the 21st through 80th percentiles), the growth in average real after-tax household income was just under 40 percent.
 For the 20 percent of the population with the lowest income, average real after-tax household income was about 18 percent higher in 2007 than it had been in 1979. 

As a result of that uneven income growth, the distribution of after-tax household income in the United States was substantially more unequal in 2007 than in 1979: The share of income accruing to higher-income households increased, whereas the share accruing to other households declined.

This data from the CBO is for real (inflation-adjusted) average household income, measured after government transfers and federal taxes. The share of total market income (labor income such as cash wages and salaries and employer paid health insurance premiums, business income, capital gains, capital income, and other income) for the top one percent of households nearly tripled over the period, leading to its share of total national income increasing from about ten percent to more than 20 percent. Tax policy increased the share of income for the rich.

The share of after-tax household income for the 1 percent of the population with the highest income more than doubled, climbing from nearly 8 percent in 1979 to 17 percent in 2007.

Worldwide Poverty is Measured in Other than Income Terms 

I quote from a Department of Health and Human Services Fact Sheet:

In 2007, nearly 40 percent of children in the United States lived in low-income families — families with incomes at or below 200 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL). Youth from low-income families are vulnerable to poor outcomes as adults, as these youth often lack the resources and opportunities found to lead to better outcomes. This fact sheet compares the young adult outcomes and adolescent risk-taking behaviors of youth from low-income families to those from middle-income (201–400 percent of FPL) and high-income (401 percent of FPL or higher) families. All differences discussed below are significant at the 95 percent confidence level or above.

• Youth from low-income families engage in more risk behaviors during adolescence (3.5 mean cumulative risks) than youth from middle-income (3.2 mean cumulative risks) and high-income (2.9 mean cumulative risks) families.[2]

• Youth from low-income families are more likely than youth from middle- and high-income families to have sex before age 16, become a member of a gang, attack someone or get into a fight, steal something worth more than 50 dollars, and ever run away.  However, youth from low-income families are not more likely than youth from middle- and high-income families to use alcohol and marijuana, sell illegal drugs, or destroy property.

• Seven percent of young women from low-income families have a child by age 18, while only 2 percent of females from middle-income families and 1 percent of females from high-income families have a birth by this age.

• Nearly a third of youth from low-income families (29 percent) fail to earn high school diplomas, approximately three times greater than the percentage of youth from middle-income families (10 percent) and roughly six times greater than the percentage of youth from high-income families (5 percent).[3]

• Only one in ten youth from low-income families (10 percent) go on to graduate from a four-year college, compared with over a quarter (28 percent) of youth from middle-income families and half (50 percent) of youth from high-income families.

• One in five youth from low-income families (20 percent) are charged with an adult crime by the age of 24, which is higher than the number of youth from middle- and high-income families (16 and 12 percent, respectively).

• Less than half of youth from low-income families (44 percent) remain consistently-connected to school and/or the labor market between ages 18 and 24, a lower share than among youth from middle- and high-income families (67 and 75 percent, respectively) (see Figure 1).[4]

• Roughly 1 in 5 youth from low-income families (18 percent) never connect (making extremely short, or no connections to school and/or the labor market between ages 18 and 24), while only 1 in 50 youth from high-income families (2 percent) fall into this category.

In the following sections I look at health, education and crime.

Source: New York Times (2008)

Gopal K. Singh, a demographer at the Department of Health and Human Services, said “the growing inequalities in life expectancy” mirrored trends in infant mortality and in death from heart disease and certain cancers.

In 1980-82, Dr. Singh said, people in the most affluent group could expect to live 2.8 years longer than people in the most deprived group (75.8 versus 73 years). By 1998-2000, the difference in life expectancy had increased to 4.5 years (79.2 versus 74.7 years), and it continues to grow, he said.

 Percentage Distribution of Parental Expectations of Academic Attainment

 for Children in Grades 6 through 12,

Source: Parental Expectations for Children's Academic Attainment

 The left hand columns are for 2003, the right hand columns for 2007. Parental expectations for the poorest households not only are much less than for more affluent households, but they actually went down.

Only about half of parents with annual incomes of less than $25,000 expect their child will attain a four-year-college degree, compared with more than eight in ten parents with incomes over $75,000.

And from the National Center for the Victims of Crime:

In 2010, households in the lowest income category (less than $7,500 per year) had a higher overall property victimization rate (168.7 per 1,000 households), compared to households earning $75,000 or more (119.3 per 1,000)