Economic inequality is destroying our democracy

“We can either have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few. But we can’t have both,” Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once warned. 

His concerns have never been more relevant. Economic and wage inequality has hit a 30-year high. Among peer countries, the U.S. ranks first in poverty, second in infant mortality and ninth in life expectancy.

These realities in the world’s wealthiest country are anything but accidental. They reflect the myriad ways in which super-rich corporations and individuals are undermining core principles of democracy: equal opportunity, popular sovereignty and government accountability.

The scale of the wealth and income gap is staggering. The top 1 percent of households own nearly one-third of the nation’s wealth. Their $55 trillion in assets equals roughly the total held by the bottom 90 percent. Over the last four decades, the income of the richest 12,000 households grew 27 times faster than that of the bottom 20 percent of households.

The gap between CEO and employee salaries has also skyrocketed. In 1978, CEOs earned 31 times the typical worker; in 2024, the ratio was 281-to-one. The top 10 percent of earners account for almost half of spending in the U.S.

Racial disparities also remain stark. Black and Hispanic households, one-third of the nation’s population, own less than 6 percent of its wealth.

The disproportionate influence of corporations and billionaires over government policies is beyond dispute. In 2025 alone, 13,000 lobbyists spent about $5 billion to influence Congress and federal government agencies. The top three spenders were the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Realtors, and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. In 2024, corporate contributions to political candidates and parties exceeded campaign spending by labor unions by a........

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