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The
problem isn’t due to the recession. Would that it were. The decade just
concluded is the first in which Americans, on average, have seen their
incomes decline. Median household income increased by about $4,000 per
decade in the 1980s and ‘90s: from $42,429 in 1980 to $46,049 in 1990 to
$50,557 in 2000 (in 2007 dollars). In 2009, the most recent year for
which we have figures, it had declined to $49,777 -- but 2009, of
course, was a year of deep recession. If we go back to the peak year of
the last decade, 2007, we find that median household income was just
$50,233 -- roughly $300 less than it had been in 2000.

Until
the housing and financial bubbles burst, of course, we enjoyed the
illusion of prosperity through the days of wine and credit. Now we stand
on unfamiliar terrain in which almost all the signs of long-term
economic health point downward. Our private sector isn’t creating jobs
at a rate commensurate with our increasing population, much less at a
level to significantly reduce unemployment. The share of our civilian
population employed has dropped to 58.2 percent -- the lowest level
since the early ‘80s, when far fewer wom... >>>