Chicago is losing its middle class:Brookings Institution report

Crain's Chicago Business reports:

The Chicago area’s middle class is disappearing.

This group shrank by 14% between 1970 and 2005, according to a report released Thursday by Brookings Institution research group. The decline was above the average slide of 10.7% for the 100 metropolitan areas included in the study, giving Chicago the eighth-largest drop in the group.

The report defines middle class as workers who earn between 80% and 150% of their metro area’s median income.

No word yet from Mayor Daley or Barack Obama or the unions they support on this one.