[teachrdan]

I am looking at your link and thinking I took crazy pills.

The graph shows just under 23% in 1989, going up past 27% by 1996, then dipping a few years later only to go up to 29% a bit before 2008, then another dip and rise to almost 32% today.

Am I misreading the graph? If not, the percentage of wealth owned by the 1% is on track to have increased 50% over ~40 years. (23% --> 34.5%)

[9x39]

True, but GP had scoped their original post to the last decade, and if you look just there (2016-2026) it does appear flat.

[0xDEAFBEAD]

I don't see why a shift from 23% to 34% should produce a qualitatively different result.

The annual US federal budget is around $7 trillion. The remaining Gates fortune is around $100B. So the feds are chewing through about 70 Gates fortunes per year. And that doesn't even account for state and local spending.

The idea that the system is crumbling because all the money is ending up in the pockets of billionaires does not pass the sniff test.