large number of people who already have high incomes increase their incomes by even more. Inequality would rise

as a result—but the number of people below the poverty line would remain unchanged.

Why did inequality of household income increase in the United States in recent decades? A trend toward

greater income inequality has occurred in many countries around the world, although the effect has been

more powerful in the U.S. economy. Economists have focused their explanations for the increasing inequality

on two factors that changed more or less continually from the 1970s into the 2000s. One set of explanations

focuses on the changing shape of American households. The other focuses on greater inequality of wages, what

some economists call “winner take all” labor markets. We will begin with how we measure inequality, and then

consider the explanations for growing inequality in the United States.

Measuring Income Distribution by Quintiles
{"file_size_mb": 26.99, "producer": "Prince 14.2 (www.princexml.com)", "batch_upload": true, "creationdate": "2022-12-07T14:15:44-06:00", "source_file": "downloads\\business\\economics\\Microeconomics3e.pdf", "total_pages": 597, "creator": "PDFMiner", "file_name": "Microeconomics3e.pdf", "title": "Principles of Microeconomics 3e", "source": "downloads\\business\\economics\\Microeconomics3e.pdf", "file_hash": "830b81f41611ac67a490444dbb5d6aed292224606965b06965b914443c93331a", "upload_timestamp": "2026-02-07T15:37:44.339247", "uploaded_via": "batch_uploader", "file_type": ".pdf", "moddate": "2022-12-07T14:23:05-06:00"}