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The UCLA Anderson Forecast
Income inequality as measured by pre-tax incomes has become progressively worse in the United States since 1970.
In this article we look at the indicators of inequality in Los Angeles and contrast them to the trends in the US in an attempt to understand how the events of the past two decades have changed the income structure of the region and the policy implications they carry for the future economic and social landscape of Los Angeles.
Unrelated to Sidney Sheldon or Barbara Eden (though clearly both skewed the income distribution), the Gini Index is a statistical tool which runs from 0 to 100 with higher values indicating a more unequal distribution of income than lower values.
The US Bureau of The Census collects data on individual incomes as well as family and household incomes.
From 1959 through 1989 the infl ation adjusted (real) midpoint or median household income in Los Angeles increased steadily.
Of those, 60,000 were in non-durable goods manufacturing, principally cut and sew jobs in the garment industry.
This is not to say that the displaced workers were individually better off, only that the overall picture with respect to this portion of the manufacturing job loss is approximately neutral as it impacts inequality in Los Angeles.
With the exception of construction, these non-manufacturing jobs require retraining and education to develop the specifi c skills required.
In this article we have seen that the Los Angeles economy from 1980 to the present time has followed a different road with respect to the distribution of income among its citizens than the US.
Posted on April 9, 2007 11:32 PM
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