In One Map Here's Why Washington Doesn't Care About Income Inequality

The U.S. Census Bureau has a ton of fantastic data visualizations, and one that is completely striking is the Bureau's look at median income by county.

The national average for median income is $51,914. However, there's a huge range. Some counties are remarkably poor and others are remarkably wealthy.

What was particularly interesting was using this tool to isolate some of the most super-wealthy regions of the United States. Since rising income inequality is such a profound issue, finding the counties that benefitted the most from it is an interesting task.

The result was striking, and goes to explain a long way why the folks in Washington D.C. don't seem to care about this issue - mostly, because they seem to have no concept of it. In this map, the green-shaded counties are the only counties in America with median household income above $100,000

Of the six counties in the United States with median income greater than $100,000, of course four of them are in the D.C. metro area.

1. Loudoun County, Va. - $115,574
2. Falls Church City, Va. - $114,409
3. Fairfax County, Va. - $105,416
4. Los Alamos County, NM - $103,643
5. Howard County, MD - $103,273
6. Hunterdon County, NJ - $100,980

That's the Beltway Bubble for you in a nutshell.