money or other gain received in a given period." For purposes of this paper, the terms money and income will be synonymous. Also, Webster's (p. 399) defines distribution as "the relative arrangement of the elements of a statistical population based on some criterion." Therefore, based on these definitions, we can determine, for purposes of this paper, that income distribution can be defined as the amount of money received by the United States population over a specified period of time. We will use the 2000 census information for our period of time. But first, the different social classes in America will be defined.
             What is a social class? "A social class consists of a group of people of roughly equivalent status in an unequal society. Various criteria are normally used to measure status to differentiate social classes. These criteria are income, property, occupation, and education" (Henderson, 2000, p. 7). In America, the primary way to determine one's social class is to look at their income. How much annual income one receives usually will determine their social class. Within the United States there three primary social classes with seven subclasses. These seven classes are the ultrarich, the wealthy, the upper middle, the middle middle, the lower middle, the working poor, and the poverty class. These classes can be determined by the following (Henderson):
             Upper Class: Includes the ultrarich and the wealthy classes.
             Ultrarich: Receives an income of more than $1 million.
             Wealthy: Receives an income between $250,000 and $1 million.
             Middle Class: Includes upper, middle, and lower middle classes.
             Upper Middle: Receives an income between $90,000 and $250,000.
             Middle Middle: Receives an income between $50,000 and $90,000.
             Lower Middle: Receives an income between $30,000 and $50,000.
             Lower Class: Includes the working poor and poverty classes.
             Working poor: Receives an ...