Dalio

Two Economies

 

Ray Dalio is the founder of Bridgewater, the world's largest hedge fund with about $160 billion in management. He posted a note on LinkedIn on Monday about some elements of the economy. Here are some selections (the underlined areas are his):

Real incomes have been flat to down slightly for the average household in the bottom 60% since 1980 (while they have been up for the top 40%). 

Those in the top 40% now have on average 10 times as much wealth as those in the bottom 60%. That is up from six times as much in 1980.

Only about a third of the bottom 60% saves any of its income (in cash or financial assets).

Only about a third of families in the bottom 60% have retirement savings accounts—e.g., pensions, 401(k)s—which average less than $20,000. 

For those in the bottom 60%, premature deaths are up by about 20% since 2000. The biggest contributors to that change are an increase in deaths by drugs/poisoning (up two times since 2000) and an increase in suicides (up over 50% since 2000).

The top 40% spend four times more on education than the bottom 60%. 

The average household income for main income earners without a college degree is half that of the average college graduate.

Since 1980, divorce rates have more than doubled among middle-aged whites without college degrees, from 11% to 23%.

The number of prime-age white men without college degrees not in the labor force has increased from 7% to 15% since 1980.

We used to have a situation called "The Underclass" of low employed, heavy abusing and abused people. Dalio now sees this disparity as expanding into what is essentially "two economies" and warns the "stress between the two economies" will "intensify over the next 5 to 1o years" because of demographic and technological change.

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