When the income gap between the rich and everyone else gets too large, the resulting inequality can threaten America’s foundations of fairness, equality and opportunity. Income inequality is deep in Alabama, and it has been getting even deeper in recent decades. Between 1979 and 2007, the top 1 percent of Alabamians saw their incomes grow by nearly 159 percent. But for everyone else in the state, the average income growth in that time was just 20.5 percent.

Policy analyst Carol Gundlach’s new report, part of ACPP’s State of Working Alabama 2014series, examines the growing income gap between the richest Alabamians and everyone else and considers the gap’s implications for the state’s economy and our children’s future. The report also considers how Medicaid expansion, investments in education and infrastructure, and other public policies could mitigate the worst effects of income inequality and promote broadly shared prosperity for all Alabamians.