Charting The Extinction Of American Disposable Income

[Huey P. Long]

Charting The Extinction Of American Disposable Income
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 01/03/2012

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Given today's excitement at a rallying equity market, we are already hearing chatter on raising GDP estimates even though macro data is benefiting from standard seasonal improvements. However, while these good times are rolling for some (who, we are not sure), Sean Corrigan (of Diapason Commodities) points to our real disposable income. The man on the street's spend-ability has seen the worst five years' growth in half a century.

For four decades, US real per capita disposable income has risen at ~20% a decade. For the average working man, that is a doubling of disposable income in a typical working life. The last 5 1/2 years, however, have seen no change whatsoever - the worst performance in at least half a century.

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http://www.zerohedge.com/news/charting-exitinction-american-disposable-income

[TheWraith]

1. Kicked and recommended for an accurate assessment.

"For four decades, US real per capita disposable income has risen at ~20% a decade. For the average working man, that is a doubling of disposable income in a typical working life. The last 5 1/2 years, however, have seen no change whatsoever - the worst performance in at least half a century."

It's kind of rare that these sorts of articles actually get the facts right: yes, income has actually been steadily rising at a healthy rate for decades, not shrinking as it's usually claimed. (I'm sure, of course, that ZeroHedge won't get the shit kicked out of them in this thread the way I did when I posted an OP pointing that ouit.

That figure is a little distorted, of course, because it doesn't control for income equality: for instance, back in the 1950s a black man would, on average, make one third of what a white man did for the same job. That means that income since 1950 has risen faster as an absolute percentage for blacks, because balance was being restored, but that also means that the "average" has risen faster than what the white worker experienced.

Still, it's always good to note that yes, wages do grow over time above the rate of inflation. That's the entire point: really, if the average person were no better off today than they were 50 years ago, it would kind of undermine the entire idea of social progress and the laws that have been enacted since then.

[starroute]

2. But what about the average working woman?

Are the figures actually different for men and women -- or is this just a vestige of unexamined sexism? In this case, it's hard to tell.

[Betty Karlson]

3. One can generally surmise

that women and minorities are always a bit harder hit, a bit more disadvantaged, a bit more held back than the average WASP man.

Your question could be rephrased for African-Americans versus Caucasians, Latinos versus Ango-Saxons, GLBT versus straight, people with disabilities versus people without them, and so on. (And by the way, I am well aware that people may belong to more than one minority, and therefore double at risk of being held back.)