Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Disaster! Woe! Misfortune!

For the Democrats, anyway.  For the rest of America, it's very, very good.  Read it and weep (emphasis mine):

Real median household income in the United States climbed 1.3 percent between 2006 and 2007, reaching $50,233, according to a report released today by the U.S. Census Bureau. This is the third annual increase in real median household income.

Meanwhile, the nation's official poverty rate in 2007 was 12.5 percent, not statistically different from 2006. There were 37.3 million people in poverty in 2007, up from 36.5 million in 2006. The number of people without health insurance coverage declined from 47 million (15.8 percent) in 2006 to 45.7 million (15.3 percent) in 2007.

I can almost hear the gnashing of Democrat teeth now!  But surely this is only good news for rich white people, right?  Uhh...no:

* Real median income (adjusted for inflation) for black and non-Hispanic white households rose between 2006 and 2007, representing the first measured real increase in annual household income for each group since 1999.

Fine, then is must only be for the very richest people, right?  Uhh...no:

* Between 2006 and 2007, real median household income rose in the Midwest ($50,277) and the South ($46,186), declined in the Northeast ($52,274) and remained statistically unchanged in the West ($54,138).

Okay, then.  Even though it's the poorest sections of the country that have seen improvement, it's probably still a gender thing, right?  Men are probably the biggest beneficiaries of these increases, right?  Uhh...no.  Men saw an increase of 3.7%, while women saw an increase of 4.7%.

Okay, fine.  Then certainly these increases must be evidence of the overall economic inequity of America, right?  The rich get richer, while the poor get poorer?  Uhh...no:

The share of aggregate income received by households in the top fifth of the income distribution declined, while the shares for the third and fourth quintiles increased. Meanwhile, the Gini index declined from 0.470 to 0.463, moving closer to 0, which represents perfect income equality (1 represents perfect inequality).

The report goes on and on, but I don't need to hammer you with more details.  The point is that more people are making more money (and getting insurance, etc.) in America with each passing year.  Sure, there are still problems, but life on the whole is getting better.  Of course, that's bad news for Democrats.  The worse the economy is, the better off their chances of unseating Republicans in November.  Don't expect this report to get much more than a brief mention (if even that) in the MSM, especially as the group swooning in Denver continues for the rest of the week.

But, the truth is the truth.

There's my two cents.

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