Was It Really Reagan’s Fault?

So I am reading a Krugman article about Reagan’s fiscal policies and how it affected America. I have a hunch that he thinks that this whole economic crisis was Reagan’s fault in the first place. He pin points it specifically to income inequality. It’s true that in the sense that only a few people saw their incomes go up while the majority of working families barely saw any gains. Back in the 1980’s, the incomes of the richest [top 2% I am thinking], grew by 62% while the incomes of the bottom grew by only 21%. So that means that the poorest of the poor only received a $143 gain [except in Alaska when the poor gained faster than the rich].

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d5/Household_Income_1967_to_2003.png

Here you can see that all incomes better benefited from the gains in 2003 than in 1967. Maybe it can be because Former President Bush fixed the Bubble Crisis in 2000? Maybe so… but check this out:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a4/Income_gains.jpg

This was from 2005 and here you can see the enormous income gap happening here and that income gap was said to have caused our current recession.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/96/Median_Personal_Income_1975_to_2005.png

If I am not mistaken, this is believed to be the gains for the median [personal] incomes. They clearly did better in 2005.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Labor/images/cda99-07cht1.gif

Here, this is from 1997. You can see the enormous income gap here as the top gets 50% of the nation’s money… more than they did under Reagan or Bush.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Labor/images/cda99-07cht2.gif
Another one from ’97…

So in my findings, the bigger income gap happened under Clinton… not Reagan.

Krugman, Paul. “Reagan Did It.” New York Times Blog 5/31/2009 1. Web.2 Jun 2009. .

Coleman, Nancy. “Press Release: Income Inequality Grew Across The Country Over The Past Two Decades: Early Signs Suggest Inequality Now Growing Again After Brief Interruption .” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities 1/26/2006 1. Web.2 Jun 2009. http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=978.

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