Wage Disparity In The United States

It has been noted of late that the income of the top 1% in the United States has gone up drastically in the last few decades compared to the average working Joe.  While this is true and I don't dispute it, why don't we take a look at where the richest counties in the US are.  This study is therefore not based on the top 1% who are being demonized in the media of late but where the highest average incomes are concentrated.  You might want to consider moving there and getting in on where the real action is.

The idea for this came to me from watching the Peter Schiff interview of the OWS'ers in New York.  You might want to check it out if you have 18 minutes.

So, where would you think the richest counties are based on income?  If you want to blame the evil CEO's of corporations for part of the destruction of our economy, especially the banksters, I would think you would probably focus on the New York area where the OWS movement started and where the banking and financial center of the United States is.  You would be wrong.

Maybe you would look in Silicon Valley or up in Washington State where Microsoft and Boeing is.  Wrong again.

Maybe you would look in the LA/Hollywood area where there are entire collections of rich movie stars and pro athletes.  Wrong again.

The top 3 counties in the United States, and 4 of the top 6, are in the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Area.  The top 25 counties can be found here.  In first place is Loudoun County, VA, with a median family income of $110,643.  2nd place goes to Fairfax County, VA with $106,785, and 3rd goes to Howard County, MD, with $101,710.   And according to the Wikipedia article of the Washington Metro Area, of the 5.5 million people living there the median income is $72,800.

To put it mildly, the Washington Metro Area is kicking ass.

"12.2% of Northern Virginia's 881,136 households, 8.5% of suburban Maryland's 799,300 households, and 8.2% of Washington's 249,805 households have an annual income in excess of $200,000, compared to 3.7% nationally."

"The various agencies of the Federal Government employ over 140,000 professionals in the Washington D.C. area. A sizable number in the Washington D.C. area work for defense and civilian contracting companies that conduct business directly with the Federal Government (many of these firms are referred to as 'Beltway Bandits' under the local vernacular). As a result, the Federal Government provides the underlying basis of the economy in the region."


Of course, not everybody in the area works directly for the government, and there are some really nice jobs in the private sector there, especially if you work in the military industrial complex.  There is no recession in that industry. 


"Many defense contractors are based in the region to be close to the Pentagon in Arlington. Local defense contractors include Lockheed Martin, the largest, as well as Raytheon, General Dynamics, BAE Systems, Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC), Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), CACI, and Orbital Sciences Corporation. Northrup Grumman is to move its headquarters to the region by the summer of 2011.<sup>\

So you can work at Wal-mart and bitch about it or you can go where the action is.  Median income at $72,800?  Sounds pretty good to me.</sup> 

William Black

If you have never heard of William Black, here is his background courtesy of Wikipedia:

Black earned a J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Irvine. Black is currently an Associate Professor of Economics and Law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City in the Department of Economics and the School of Law. He was the Executive Director of the Institute for Fraud Prevention from 2005-2007 and previously taught at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, and at Santa Clara University.^[2]

Black was litigation director for the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB) from 1984 to 1986, deputy director of the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (FSLIC) in 1987, and Senior VP and the General Counsel of the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco from 1987 to 1989, which regulated some of the largest thrift banks in the U.S.<sup>[3]

If there is anybody on the planet who knows banking regulations and banking law better than William Black, I would like to know who it is.  He was instrumental in helping to get over 1000 felony convictions during the S&L crisis 30 years ago.  Have you ever wondered why nobody in the current financial crisis has been prosecuted?

This 30-minute interview with Bill Moyers explains why.  As far as I am concerned, this is the most important video of the last decade. 

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04032009/watch.html

Finally, this is a long article, but check out who thinks the TBTF banks should be broken up due to insolvency, with links:

http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/only-way-save-economy-break-giant-insolvent-banks</sup>

• Nobel prize-winning economist, Joseph Stiglitz

• Nobel prize-winning economist, Ed Prescott

• Former chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan

• Former chairman of the Federal Reserve, Paul Volcker

• Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich

• Dean and professor of finance and economics at Columbia Business School, and chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President George W. Bush, R. Glenn Hubbard

• Simon Johnson (and see this)

• Former 20-year President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, who was today nominated to be FDIC Vice Chair Thomas Hoenig (and see this)

• President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, Richard Fisher (and see this)

• President of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, Thomas Bullard

• Deputy Treasury Secretary, Neal S. Wolin

• The President of the Independent Community Bankers of America, a Washington-based trade group with about 5,000 members, Camden R. Fine

• The Congressional panel overseeing the bailout (and see this)

• The head of the FDIC, Sheila Bair

• The head of the Bank of England, Mervyn King

• The leading monetary economist and co-author with Milton Friedman of the leading treatise on the Great Depression, Anna Schwartz

• Economics professor and senior regulator during the S & L crisis, William K. Black

• Leading British economist, John Kay

• Economics professor, Nouriel Roubini

• Economist, Marc Faber

• Professor of entrepreneurship and finance at the Chicago Booth School of Business, Luigi Zingales

• Economics professor, Thomas F. Cooley

• Economist Dean Baker

• Economist Arnold Kling

• Former investment banker, Philip Augar

• Chairman of the Commons Treasury, John McFall

Others, like Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, think that the giant insolvent banks may need to be temporarily nationalized.

I will refrain from adding my opinion to all of this information.  It speaks for itself.

Always Reporting The News That Matters

Man jailed after trying to turn faeces into gold

 A man from Northern Ireland has been jailed after an experiment in which he attempted to turn his own faeces into gold went wrong and started a fire in a block of flats.

Paul Moran will now serve three months in jail and a further 12 months on license after the failed experiment caused a fire at his Housing Executive home in Derrin Park, Enniskillen.

Moran admitted arson and endangering the lives of others in the fire, which reportedly caused over £3,000 worth of damage.

It is thought that as part of the bizarre experiment Moran left his faeces, along with other waste products such as fertiliser, on a heater.

In his ruling Judge McFarland told Moran: “Rather bizarrely you were attempting to make gold from human faeces and waste products.

“It was an interesting experiment to fulfil the alchemist’s dream, but wasn’t going to succeed.”
Moran’s barrister mentioned that his client was a man of ‘considerable intellectual ability’ but that he had problems battling drug abuse.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/man-jailed-after-trying-to-turn-faeces-into-gold-.html

9-9-9?