The death of the middle class... In numbers!

That a capitalist economy has a monopolistic tendency is not a novelty... but now that we are starting to really face the death of our middle class we seem somehow shocked by the novelty.


Income distribution and disparity are the best indicators of this trend, which seams not to be a linear one, but frighteningly enough, an exponential one.


Here are some charts and graphs that I found very interesting and useful to visualize the situation:

Gini Coefficient: The Gini coefficient is a measure of the inequality of a distribution, a value of 0 expressing total equality and a value of 1 maximal inequality. 

Have a look at the article published by the BBC about this theme

And now have look at the income distribution in the United States from 1979 till 2007:

The numbers: BRIC vs. G7

Born as a simple marketing idea, the acronym "BRIC" is starting to symbolize the shift of the needle of the balance of the global economy from the industrialized nations to the emerging economies. 

.... But perhaps all that glitters is not gold, and even if the BRIC nations have been recording an impressive growth in the last few years and can count on a massive labour force and significant resources, they are still far from being comparable with the G7. Their GDP to Population ration is 14 times smaller than ours and the wealth is even less equally distributed than in the G7 countries (with the US being the most unbalanced having a Gini coefficient of 0,47).

Gini Coefficient: The Gini coefficient is a measure of the inequality of a distribution, a value of 0 expressing total equality and a value of 1 maximal inequality.

GDP: Gross domestic product (GDP) refers to the market value of all final goods and services produced in a country in a given period.