By Frank Bass and Timothy R. Homan
Federal employees whose compensation averages more than $126,000 and the nation?s greatest concentration of lawyers helped Washington edge out San Jose as the wealthiest U.S. metropolitan area, government data show.
The U.S. capital has swapped top spots with Silicon Valley, according to recent Census Bureau figures, with the typical household in the Washington metro area earning $84,523 last year. The national median income for 2010 was $50,046.
The figures demonstrate how the nation?s political and financial classes are prospering as the economy struggles with unemployment above 9 percent and thousands of Americans protest in the streets against income disparity, said Kevin Zeese, director of Prosperity Agenda, a Baltimore-based advocacy group trying to narrow the divide between rich and poor.
?There?s a gap that?s isolating Washington from the reality of the rest of the country,? Zeese said. ?They just get more and more out of touch.?
Total compensation for federal workers, including health care and other benefits, last year averaged $126,369, compared with $122,697 in 2009, according to Bloomberg News calculations of Commerce Department data. There were 170,467 federal employees in the District of Columbia as of June. The Washington area includes the District of Columbia, parts of Northern Virginia, eastern Maryland and eastern West Virginia.
Read More
Image: Mary Ann Reitano
Latest Economy
- Economic Crisis: How to Cause Them and How to Make Them Worse | Hans-Hermann Hoppe
- "I Am The 1%. Let's Talk."
- 10 Mind Blowing Facts Which Show How Members Of Congress And Federal Employees Are Living The High Life At Our Expense
- Rethinking the Gold Bubble
- Disparities of Wealth
- Protectionism Could Lead To American Poverty
- New York Fed: Student loan debt now over $1 trillion
- A Long, Steep Drop for Americans' Standard of Living
This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill
