America’s Middle Class is No Longer the Economic Majority

The middle class in America is no longer the economic majority, a new report from the Pew Research Center found.

According to the report, in the beginning of 2015, there were 120.8 million adults who fell into the middle-income household category. This tally, for the first time in four decades that the center has been recording this data, is less than the combined total number of adults from low-income and high-income households. That number was 121.3 million.

"I don't think it is anything we should be worried about," said Scott Winship, a senior fellow the Institute reported by The Washington Post. "More important than how many people are in certain income ranges, is whether people are moving up."

The report added that since 1971, the percentage of adults in middle-class has fallen from 61 percent to around 50 percent whereas the rates for adults in the low-income and high-income groups have increased from 25 percent to 29 percent and from 14 percent to 21 percent, respectively.

The increase in the percentage of adults that fall under the high-income group does represent "economic progress," the report noted, according to Huffington Post. This group of Americans is also getting larger at a much faster pace than the other two groups. The median income for the high-income group increased by 47 percent from 1970 to 2014. The increases recorded for the other two groups were 34 percent (middle) and 28 percent (low).

The report also found that incomes for married couples, older Americans, and African Americas have been increasing as well. However, African Americans and seniors are still more likely to be in the low-income class and the least likely to be in the high-income class.

The Pew Research Center defines middle-class as people who earn an income that is two-thirds or double the national median. In 2015, the middle-class income range for a three-person household would be from $42,000 to $126,000 per year.