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Tennessee's rich really are getting richer, poor getting poorer

wallethub.com

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (WMOT)  --  A new study ranks Tennessee as one of the poorest states in the nation.

The personal finance website wallethub.comrecently used census and tax data to rank incomes in all fifty states and the District of Columbia. Tennessee came in 11th from the bottom, well behind neighboring states Virginia and Georgia, but ahead of Arkansas and Mississippi.

Wallethub’s Jill Gonzalez says it may be cliché, but the rich really are getting richer and the poor, poorer.

“The richest one percent of Americans have capture 95% of post-recession growth, and the bottom 90 percent of Americans are continuing to get poorer. In fact, the average Middle Class household still earns almost $4500 less than it did pre-recession.”

Gonzalez says that in Tennessee, one person in five earns less than $25,000 a year, while just over three percent of Tennesseans earn more than $200,000.