Rich getting richer and richer and richer

Little by little, and then with big chunks in the past 10 to 20 years, the distribution of wealth in the U.S. has steeped as if a seesaw tilting upward where the small seat at the bottom has nails sticking out and puncturing 80 percent of the population’s butts.

Most of us have little idea how wealth is truly distributed in this country today. The fact is that studies demonstrate that only the 10 percent at the top is better off – as compared to not so long ago. And the now-infamous one percenters are off the chart in their gains. Consider this fact: 40 percent of the nation’s wealth is concentrated in that one percent! And the bottom 80 percent (probably you and I), we possess seven percent of that wealth. Go back and re-read these last two sentences. They are true. And alarming.

Let me tell you more:

• The top one percent’s income has tripled over the last 30 years.
• The top one percent owns 50% of the country’s stocks, bonds and mutual funds.
• The bottom 50% of us are barely scraping by – we own one-half of one percent of the aforementioned investments. 

It’s the gross inequality and unfairness that should bother us all. For example, did you know that today’s CEO makes a salary that is 380 times larger than his average employee? Let me emphasize, it’s not the lowest paid employee I speak of. No, I mean the average employee – the person in the middle. In other words, and this should cause us to burn deep inside: an average worker must work more than a month to equal the pay the CEO makes in ONE HOUR!

Folks, I believe in paying the guy at the top what he or she is worth. But does any one person work 380 times harder than his or her average employee?

Watch the video that follows. It repeats these figures and offers others.

Alvaro F. Fernandez