The graphs that speak volumes

Pay differences  

Take a look at the above graphs of Income distribution in the UK from 1962 to there's quite a lot to look at but one factor that I think most interesting is the appearance at the far right end of the scale of the line of people earning more than £1,100 a week (at 2005/06 prices). This line appears for the first time in 1982 and rises until steadily until 1992 when it settles down at about one thousand individuals. Now click on through the years and note how that line shoots up after 1997 all the way through to 2005. Now does that not mean that the 'super-rich' only really started to appear in numbers under the last Labour government?

Oddly that is not the point that the BBC's Mark Easton made in his blog entry which is where I found the graphs...