PHA-Exchange> In Manhattan, Poor Make 2¢ for Each Dollar to the Rich

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From: "Joel Moskowitz" <jmm at uclink4.berkeley.edu>
 <spiritof1848 at yahoogroups.com>


In Manhattan, Poor Make 2¢ for Each Dollar to the Rich

Sam Roberts, New York Times, September 4, 2005

Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue is only about 60 blocks from the Wagner Houses
in East Harlem, but they might as well be light years apart. They epitomize
the highest- and lowest-earning census tracts in Manhattan, where the
disparity between rich and poor is now greater than in any other county in
the country.

That finding, in an analysis conducted for The New York Times, dovetails
with other new regional economic research, which identifies the Bronx as
the poorest urban county in the country and suggests that the middle class
in New York State is being depleted.

The top fifth of earners in Manhattan now make 52 times what the lowest
fifth make - $365,826 compared with $7,047 - which is roughly comparable to
the income disparity in Namibia, according to the Times analysis of 2000
census data. Put another way, for every dollar made by households in the
top fifth of Manhattan earners, households in the bottom fifth made about 2
cents.

That represents a substantial widening of the income gap from previous
years. In 1980, the top fifth of earners made 21 times what the bottom
fifth made in Manhattan, which ranked 17th among the nation's counties in
income disparity.

By 1990, Manhattan ranked second behind Kalawao County, Hawaii, a former
leper colony with which it had little in common except for that signature
grove of palm trees at the World Financial Center. The rich in Manhattan
made 32 times the average of the poor then, or $174,486 versus $5,435.

The growing disparity in Manhattan helped drive New York from 11th among
cities with the biggest income disparities in 1980 to fifth in 1990 and
fourth in 2000, behind Atlanta; Berkeley, Calif.; and Washington, according
to the analysis.

Last week, the Census Bureau reported that even as the economy grew around
the nation, incomes stagnated and poverty rates rose. The Bronx, with a
poverty rate of 30.6 percent, was outranked only by three border counties
in Texas where living costs are lower.

A separate analysis, being released this weekend warns that the middle class
is being depleted while the rich are getting richer and the poor are growing
in number and barely getting by - more so in New York State and particularly
upstate.

Compared with the poorest Manhattanites, those in the top fifth are
disproportionately male, non-Hispanic white and married. Roughly equal
proportions among rich and poor are immigrants, are employed by private
profit-making companies and work in sales.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/04/nyregion/04income.html