[lowracle]

The article seems to indicate that those gains are all paper money due to the huge inflation in the stock market. On paper they look richer, but they can't do much with their "money" anyway. I think a more rational measure of inequality is through the possession of "important" assets like real estate, lands, power (political influence, ...). Of course the real problem comes when the lower and middle class sells their real wealth for stocks at the top, and the 1 percenters sell them their paper gains for "important" assets.

[lotsofpulp]

>On paper they look richer, but they can't do much with their "money" anyway.

But they can, and it's the best way to gain wealth. You can use paper wealth as collateral, allowing you to borrow much more.

[tejohnso]

You don't think equity in a company is an important asset?

Is wealth in a mortgage-free triplex appraised at $1MM today inequal to equities in $MSFT that is worth $1MM today? If so, in what way is the wealth of the stockholder less important or less valuable? I don't think we can be sure that the real estate is going to provide more growth over time. I'm not sure by what other means the real estate could be considered more important.

Note that a pretax income of ~$500,000 puts you in the 1 percenters league. So the type of investment value in my example is probably fairly realistic.

[sct202]

Yeah housing prices in a lot of areas have barely recovered to the last peak from 12 years ago (and housing equity has traditionally comprised most of the "middle class"'s wealth), while stocks are like at least double (not even including dividends).

[adjkant]

If you're focusing on houses, you're looking in the wrong place. Look at rental property values, particularly in cities but even suburban areas.