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A bonanza at the top
By every statistical measure, the richest workers in King County got a lot richer from 1990 to 1998.
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Skilled workers got better raises
The more people earned, the more likely their pay raises outran inflation in the 1990s.
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So the gap grew between rich and poor? Maybe not ...
This analysis of household income in Puget Sound, extracted from the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey, tells a slightly different story.
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... lower incomes grew, too
If many individual workers' wages haven't kept up with inflation, their household incomes appear to have done much
better.
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Gaining ground on the U.S.
While the U.S. economy hummed in the 1990s, it zoomed in our area.
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Two ways to measure money
The median worker's wage in King County grew 32 percent from 1990 to 1998, keeping pace with the Seattle-Tacoma metro area Consumer Price Index.
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King County 'living wage' budgets
Being a single parent in Seattle on an ordinary income is an extraordinary challenge.
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Job growth at the extremes
King County's economy churned out new jobs from 1990 to 1998 - more than 175,000 in all - and this analysis of state wage data suggests the hottest growth was at the top and bottom of the scale.
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Jobs grew faster than people
Perhaps the most striking statistic of the Puget Sound economy is the jobs-to-population ratio, which has been shrinking for 30 years and shows no sign of reversing.
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What people make
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How we spent our time and money
during the last year in King County
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Then and Now
Whether your pay keeps up with the cost of living depends on what you buy.
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Houses in King County: getting bigger.
The percentage of houses over 3,000 square feet has risen nearly tenfold.
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Houses in King County: getting bigger.
The size of the average new King County house has nearly doubled since the 1940s.
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A tale of two neighborhoods.
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