1. The One Percent.
- Author
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Keister, Lisa A.
- Subjects
- *
RICH people , *INCOME inequality , *SOCIAL stratification , *SOCIAL mobility , *ECONOMIC sociology , *PUBLIC demonstrations , *WEALTH , *OCCUPY Wall Street protest movement - Abstract
Recent protest movements brought attention to the one percent, a segment of the population that is critical to understanding inequality and social mobility but that attracts relatively little research attention. In this article, I survey current research on the one percent in the United States. I distinguish income from wealth and show that both are very concentrated but that the concentration of wealth, particularly financial wealth, is extremely high. I describe the demographic traits and finances of households who are in the one percent and discuss how these have changed in the past decade. I review literature that explains rising top incomes, and I propose that future research will usefully concentrate more on top wealth owners and on the demographic and life course processes that underlie income and wealth concentration. I conclude by speculating about why Americans are so tolerant of resource concentration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2014
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