I think income is still too crude and misleading. You really need some kind of complex individual economic health measure made of many indicators.
But a more informative proxy would be median net worth - individual, not household, with married couple net worth divided by two for simplicity - as a fairly simple assets vs liabilities calculation.
The net worth distribution would be even more revealing because it would highlight the difference between owners and renters.
This still doesn't reveal net worth stability. In the US you can - and many people do - go from a seven figure net worth to bankruptcy because of a health crisis or (increasingly) a climate disaster.
So you'd want a supplemental distribution showing how variable net worth is, how many people are reduced to bankruptcy at each decile, and how much movement there is in each decile.
Reducing these kinds of complexities to a single number seems misleading at best.
But a more informative proxy would be median net worth - individual, not household, with married couple net worth divided by two for simplicity - as a fairly simple assets vs liabilities calculation.
The net worth distribution would be even more revealing because it would highlight the difference between owners and renters.
This still doesn't reveal net worth stability. In the US you can - and many people do - go from a seven figure net worth to bankruptcy because of a health crisis or (increasingly) a climate disaster.
So you'd want a supplemental distribution showing how variable net worth is, how many people are reduced to bankruptcy at each decile, and how much movement there is in each decile.
Reducing these kinds of complexities to a single number seems misleading at best.