One of the great myths of the 1980s is that "the rich got richer and the poor got poorer". We have seen from the income numbers that on the whole everyone made more money. Here we disprove one of the associated myths: that the rich got richer at the expense of a downtrodden underclass.

The table below clearly demonstrates that there was no static underclass, that of those paying taxes (the only ones for whom accurate records can be obtained) fully 65% of the people in the poorest quintile moved up at least two quintiles during the 1980s and 85.7% moved up at least one quintile. See also the data for income and mobility.

Source: The Wall Street Journal; Tuesday, June 2, 1992, Page A2.

Up and Down: Income-Group Mobility 1979-1988
Status in 1979	Status in 1988
	Top 1%	Next 19%	Next 20%	Middle 20%	Next 20%	Bottom 20%
Top 1%	47.3	38.6	7.7	3.8	0.4	2.2
Top 2%-20%	5.3	59.4	20.3	9.4	4.4	1.1
Next Richest 20%	0.6	34.8	37.5	14.8	9.3	3.1
Middle 20%	0.4	14.6	32.3	33.0	14.0	5.7
Next Poorest 20%	0.3	10.8	19.5	29.6	29.0	10.9
Poorest 20%	0.3	14.4	25.3	25.0	20.7	14.2

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