Year: 1997
Type: article
Abstract: This article describes some facts about financial inequality in the United States that a good theory of inequality must be able to explain. These include the facts that \nlabor earnings, income, and wealth are all unequally distributed among U.S. \nhouseholds, but the distributions are significantly different. Wealth is much more \nconcentrated than the other two. Wealth is positively correlated with earnings and \nincome, but not strongly. The movement of households up and down the economic \nscale is greater when measured by income than by earnings or wealth. Differences \nacross the three variables remain when the data are disaggregated by age, \nemployment status, educational level, and marital status of the heads of U.S. \nhouseholds. Each of these classifications also has significant differences across \nhouseholds. All the facts are based on data taken from the 1992 Survey of \nConsumer Finances and the 1984–85 and 1989–90 Panel Study of Income \nDynamics.
Source: Quarterly Review
DOI: 10.21034/qr.2121
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Reduced inequalities
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2108052618