Fed Report on Family Incomes

For those of you who follow these things the Federal Reserve Borad has just published a report based on the 2001 and 2004 surveys of family incomes. The report can be found here: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System

The headline making nugget of information is that average incomes, after inflation, fell 2.3% between 2001 and 2004 to $70,700. Meanwhile the median rose slightly, by 1.6%, over the same time to $43,200. The good news is that the median level of net worth rose slightly also: up 1.5% to $93,100 [although that rise is dwarfed by the 10.3% gain during the period 1998 to 2001].

This is a depressing result given that the economy has generally performed well over that same period. It is more evidence to support the notion that the Bush administration has skewed things away from returns on wages and salaries towards returns on capital. Which is great if you own tons of stock, but isn’t if you work for a living.