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That's why honest statisticians use the median, the value where half are above and half are below, and why no one but academics ever publishes income distribution charts.
In unequal societies like the US and Britain, income distributions don't even come close to resembling a bell curve, where the median would equal the average. The median in these countries is skewed far below the average, as you guessed.
Also, the shape of the curve is highest around the one-half-median income. Conservative politics in both parties has over 40 years shifted the 'poverty level', used to calculate government benefits, below even the half-median.
Richard
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