Yellen ‘Greatly’ Concerned by Widening U.S Inequality

Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen said she’s “greatly” concerned by the most sustained rise in U.S. wealth and income inequality since the 19th century, while declining to offer any policy prescriptions.

The lower half of U.S. households by wealth held 1 percent of the total last year, according to 2013 data from the Fed Survey of Consumer Finances, while the wealthiest 5 percent held 63 percent, Yellen said today in the text of a speech prepared for delivery at a Boston Fed conference on economic inequality.