From: http://tax.com/taxcom/taxblog.nsf/Permalink/UBEN-8AGMUZ?OpenDocument

"The number of Americans making $50 million or more, the top income category in the data, fell from 131 in 2008 to 74 last year. But that’s only part of the story.

The average wage in this top category increased from $91.2 million in 2008 to an astonishing $518.8 million in 2009. That’s nearly $10 million in weekly pay!



In the Great Recession year of 2009 (officially just the first half of the year), the average pay of the very highest-income Americans was more than five times their average wages and bonuses in 2008. And even though their numbers shrank by 43 percent, this group’s total compensation was 3.2 times larger in 2009 than in 2008, accounting for 0.6 percent of all pay. These 74 people made as much as the 19 million lowest-paid people in America, who constitute one in every eight workers.

What does this all mean? It is the latest, and in this case quite dramatic, evidence that our economic policies in Washington are undermining the nation as a whole.We have created a tax system that changes continually as politicians manipulate it to extract campaign donations. We have enabled ‘‘free trade’’ that is nothing of the sort, but rather tax-subsidized mechanisms that encourage American manufacturers to close their domestic factories, fire workers, and then use cheap labor in China for products they send right back to the United States. 

The American economy in the three decades before Ronald Reagan’s election did not produce a mass audience for celebrating wealth. In that era, books that emphasized character sold better than today. 

During the years from 1950 to 1980, the share of total income going to those at the top declined, and the real incomes of the vast majority grew much more quickly than did nearly all incomes at the very top.

In those years, America had the money, and vision, to invest in the future through education, research, and infrastructure. 

In nearly three decades of Reaganism, however, we have become a society of mine-here-and-now. Now what we hear from Washington is about today, not tomorrow. War without sacrifice (or a congressional declaration). Savings without interest. More government services while lowering taxes.

In this era, the incomes of the vast majority have barely grown while incomes at the top have soared."

The Republicans were in charge for all of this debacle. Don't believe the lies they tell you now.  There is a reason that the Democrats are supported by working people and the republicans are supported by business - because that's who they work for.

DON'T BELIEVE THE LIES OF THE GOP.