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A passage from a Thomas Sowell book about “stagnant wages” for whoever posted that thread

DavidTheWizzard

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Feb 9, 2014
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“ another factor often omitted, or distorted, and discussions of income disparity is in the time dimension. People in the bottom 20% are often spoken of as “the poor“ and, if The income in that quintile has not changed much over some span of years it may be said that the income of “the poor“ has stagnated. But the great majority of people initially in the bottom quintile do not stay there permanently

Most of the people in that bottom quintile initially are likely to be gone in later years, precisely because their incomes have not stagnated, and our concern is for the fate of flesh and blood human beings, not the fate of abstract statistical categories

A University of Michigan study that followed a given set of working Americans from 1975 to 1991 found a 95% of the people initially in the bottom 20% we’re no longer there at the end of that period. We’re over, 29% of those initially in the bottom quintile rose all the way to the top quintile, why only 5% still remain at the bottom 20%

Since 5% of 20% is 1%, only 1% of the total population sample constituted “the poor“ throughout the year studied. Statements about how the income of “the poor” fair during those years would apply only to that 1% of the people“

Just figured I’d give the opinion from a real economist and not bunker homies
 
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