curiousontheroad:

This chart is deceptively misleading. The Post removed it from its website with this note:

(This post initially used a chart that included data that we and others misunderstood. It did not reflect the wealth of Congress, but instead the wealth of the country, described according to numbers of seats in Congress. The Fix regrets the error.)

I’m not exactly sure how to read this chart, then, but it does not show how rich members of Congress are. For that, read this excellent New York Times analysis.

cheatsheet:

soupsoup:

Why people hate Congress, in one chart

based on data from Wealth, Income, and Power

For Occupy Wall Street’s take on this, we got Jeff Smith, a member of the OWS press team, to write a piece about the cash that’s corrupting Congress. 

As curiousontheroad points out, The Fix, a Washington Post blog, has taken this chart off of a related article, explaining that the chart “did not reflect the wealth of Congress, but instead the wealth of the country, described according to numbers of seats in Congress.”

The URL listed on the graphic leads to a study on wealth and income distribution among the U.S. population, not that of Congress. Strangely, the above graphic does not appear in the report. 

In this case, we too were misled, have little idea how to actually read this graphic, and regret the error.