We break down the latest data on income inequality in Oregon. OCPP policy analyst Tyler Mac Innis explains that the gap separating the rich and everyone else remains vast, even with the dip in income inequality seen in the two years following the peak set in 2021. That dip may have already reversed, given that the job-market factors driving the decline during the pandemic years have disappeared. And going forward, the budget bill enacted by the Republican majority in Congress earlier this year — a package containing massive tax cuts mainly benefiting the rich — threatens to worsen inequality in the years to come.

Tyler highlights the long-term trends since 1980, the impact of inequality on health, economic mobility, and democracy, and why today’s disparities are the result of policy choices—not inevitability.

For more information, read our recent report.