Middle class wipe out

40% drop in the median income in the past four years.  It looks like this:

via Slate, who attributes the result to declining wages and incomes, the stock market crash, and the bursting of the housing bubble.  The stock market and housing crash might be considered one-offs (if you're an eternal optimist) but declining wages looks to be structural and endearing in nature, and in fact should worsen because labor is engaged in a global competition, with the result, as we have seen, that productivity gains have not gone to workers:

via politics of equality blog.