Well, of course, you didn't--and this is no Nigerian prince scam. Rather, it's the average income for the top 400 earners in the U.S. This isn't the top 1 percent. This is the ubber top percenters, the .001 percent.
Per The Wall Street Journal:
The 400 individuals and couples reporting the highest adjusted gross income for 2010 – the latest data available – earned an average of $265 million per return, according to new statistics from the Internal Revenue Service. The agency has tracked such data since 1992.
The total income for the group of 400 taxpayers was $106 billion. Although the 2010 total was far higher than the $81 billion earned by the group in 2009 during the financial crisis, it was still well below the $138 billion reported for 2007, the record high.
The 2010 figure came to 1.3% of total income reported by all U.S. taxpayers. In 1992, by comparison, the top 400 claimed 0.5% of total income.
To make the list, taxpayers had to have at least $99 million of income, well below the 2007 cutoff of $138.8 million. In 1992, the threshold was $24.4 million.
In 2010, the top 400 returns reported an average of $150 million in net capital-gains income. On average, these taxpayers received 57% of their income from capital gains, as opposed to other sources of income such as wages. About 80% of the capital gains qualified for lower rates, according to the IRS data. The group reported dividends averaging $34 million each.[emphasis added]
Note the part about capital gains not wages. These people mostly don't work for a living wage. They sit back and collect money from investments.
In fact, more than likely, a large part of their wealth comes precisely from the poverty of everyone else. You see, the entire economy thrives on poverty--low wages, way below the productivity gains of the past 30 years, fatten up the profits of corporations like Wal-Mart and most major companies.
And those top 400 earners are going to be the very owners of those companies and/or largest shareholders-investors.
So, they thank you very much for your hard work because without your hard work--actually, your slave-like wages, no real health care, no pensions--they could not live in the style they have become greatly accustomed to.