2.5% of Wealth? Not so fast Charlie...

[flacaltenn]

I tried to verify this class war factoid pie chart showing that the bottom 50% controls only 2.5% of the wealth in America. Spent a couple hours tracing back to dead-ends about

1) HOW was the data derived?

2) Are these 50% of individuals, families, taxfilers?

3) Does it count wealth sent back to families abroad? Money stashed abroad?

4) WHERE can one FIND this data? Who is the source?

5) What exactly did it measure? Did it count household goods, collections, heirlooms, ect?

6) Where did the DEBT figures come from? Since Wealth = Assets - Liabilities?

7) Where did they get access to individual holdings in pension funds, stocks, equities, and real estate?

8) I own 65% of my house, which people own the other 35%?

9) Can anyone find ONE major newspaper or journal that has reviewed this factoid and the analysis of where the data came from?

The ONLY place I ever disclosed to ANYONE my net worth is on the Federal Application for Student Aid (FAFSA) form.. THIS sample of the population would be extremely biased since the reporting comes predominantly from the UPPER 50%! Even my broker only has a VERBAL estimate of my "wealth".

Aren't those leftists peddling this point the least bit interested in WHERE the source of the data came from? (NO!!)

I traced the "source" back to approx here..

Wealth holdings remain unequal in good and bad times | State of Working America

Wolff, Edward. 2010. Unpublished analysis of the Survey of Consumer Finances (2007) & Federal Reserve Flow of Funds (2009) data prepared in 2010 for the Economic Policy Institute.

NOTE ---> the SOURCE is an "UNPUBLISHED analysis of the Survey of Consumer Finances". If that passes for the smell test for you --- you MUST be a class warrior, Daily Kos dwelling leftist.

 

[signelect]

I think that this class war thing is getting out of hand, I am on the low end because I did not save like I should have during my working career and now live on SS and a job. I am not the least bit upset with the family that saved and live in the big our with the big car. I doubt that they are any happier than I am. The politicians, both sides) love to get us off fretting over this crap so we don't focus on how little they actually do for the rewards, that they have voted for them selves. They are playing us for chumps and they are winning. Wake up and vote for the right people who will listen to you and do what you want.

 

[flacaltenn]

I think that this class war thing is getting out of hand, I am on the low end because I did not save like I should have during my working career and now live on SS and a job. I am not the least bit upset with the family that saved and live in the big our with the big car. I doubt that they are any happier than I am. The politicians, both sides) love to get us off fretting over this crap so we don't focus on how little they actually do for the rewards, that they have voted for them selves. They are playing us for chumps and they are winning. Wake up and vote for the right people who will listen to you and do what you want.

Agreed.. Wealth is not a guarantee of bliss is it?

In this case, the class warriors are misfiring by not understanding how complicated it would be to determine what wealth distributions actually are. A lot of the folks you know could be living in $500K homes and driving luxury cars and have a "net wealth" of close to zero. (Maybe negative if they bought the home in the past 10 years.) Should those folks be classed as poor and oppressed or just living dangerously?

 

[signelect]

I think that this class war thing is getting out of hand, I am on the low end because I did not save like I should have during my working career and now live on SS and a job. I am not the least bit upset with the family that saved and live in the big our with the big car. I doubt that they are any happier than I am. The politicians, both sides) love to get us off fretting over this crap so we don't focus on how little they actually do for the rewards, that they have voted for them selves. They are playing us for chumps and they are winning. Wake up and vote for the right people who will listen to you and do what you want.

Agreed.. Wealth is not a guarantee of bliss is it?

In this case, the class warriors are misfiring by not understanding how complicated it would be to determine what wealth distributions actually are. A lot of the folks you know could be living in $500K homes and driving luxury cars and have a "net wealth" of close to zero. (Maybe negative if they bought the home in the past 10 years.) Should those folks be classed as poor and oppressed or just living dangerously?

Susie Orman was recently quoted as saying that the American dream of bigger, better, more was dead. She said that this was the 1980's dream, bigger house than we could afford, better car than we could afford and more of everything that we didn't need. Today the number one business is self storage,

 

[flacaltenn]

So nobody has a clue where this 2.5% of the wealth is controlled by the bottom 50% of the population B.S. came from eh? Chris? TM?