In honor of Labor Day, the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center has released a new report that shows growing income inequality in the state between high-wage and low-wage workers.
The gap between rich and poor is wider in Massachusetts than in other states, according to the survey.
The authors analyzed federal statistics, and found the top earners in the Bay State saw their pay go up significantly, from $25 an hour in 1984 to $35 an hour today, after adjusting for inflation. As for the poorest workers? Their income has remained stagnant since 1979, leading to a big gap in wealth.
This is different than what's happening nationally, said Noah Berger, one of the report's chief authors.
"While it's a bad thing that inequality is growing here, it's growing not because our lowest-wage workers are doing worse. They're doing poorly everywhere. But in Massachusetts higher-wage workers are doing even better than higher-wage workers than in the rest of the country," Berger said. "So I think the problem of inequality is one of a challenge of what can we do to lift up folks at the bottom and make sure that when we see economic progress, which we have in Massachusetts, that it's shared by everybody."
Berger says in the short term there's not a lot that can be done in any one state to narrow the income gap. But in the long term, he said, the state can raise the minimum wage and make sure low-income kids have access to the highest possible quality of education.
