New York: A Tale of Three Cities

A new report from the Pew Research Center reveals that the middle class is shrinking in nine out of ten American cities, including New York, making this the first time in our nation’s history that the middle class doesn’t make up the economic majority, 6sqft reports.

One in five New Yorkers live below the poverty line – including the city’s growing legion of homeless people – while the upper five percent of Manhattan residents earned more than $860,000 in 2014. Despite these staggering numbers, New York City does not have the most glaring income inequality. The top five cities to win that dubious honor are Boston, New Orleans, Atlanta, Cincinnati, and Providence.

The above map, produced by software company Esri, is a graphic illustration of these trends. The blue areas represent New York City neighborhoods where the annual household income is above $200,000, while the yellow areas represent areas where it’s below $25,000. Those hard-to-spot gray areas are home to the shrinking middle class.

Which means it’s time for New York City to adopt a new mantra: “Get rich, get poor, or get out.”