When education was less important and less widespread, large numbers of children were economically active. Similarly, retirement was not a viable concept in the agricultural economy of the early 20th century. But Social Security and stable jobs enabled men in particular to fund an increasingly lengthy retirement. In 1999, barely 17 percent of men ages 65 and older were in the paid labor force. So, demographic trends alone would have produced higher incomes as Americans continued to re-orient their lives in search of higher incomes.
Median income varies among population groups.
Household income was highest for Asians, followed by non-Hispanic whites, and it was lowest for Hispanics. Annual per capita income is more descriptive of racial and ethnic differences in how much individuals earn. This order parallels the relative median age of each of these population groups, as well as their relative educational attainment. Asians, for example, have more education than non-Hispanic whites, but have lower incomes. The U.S. economy worked its way through a major structural change in the 1980s and 1990s, as employers adjusted to the new computing and communications technologies, and a trade-dominated globalization of many economic activities.