Is the Distribution of Income Shifting Away from Workers?

A popular and highly politicized theme today is that US workers are falling behind as their real wages fall and income gets redistributed to the rich. The Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution, led by Robert Rubin, Lawrence Summers and Roger Altman, is dedicated to the study of this problem. The development of a wealth gap, shown by a decline in worker compensation relative to household wealth, has caught the attention of many critics because it suggests that workers are falling behind compared with those with income from capital. This inference is questioned here.