The rich get richer: Income and wealth gap grows over the past decade

The nation's income and wealth gap increased in the past decade. Executives and other highly-paid professionals now receive more than one-third of all pay in the United States, according a Wall Street Journal analysis of Social Security data (subscription required).

The base pay of employees whose income was above the Social Security wage cutoff -- now $106,800 -- increased 78 percent, or by almost $1 trillion, from 2002 to 2007. During the same period, income for workers increased just 24 percent.