FIGURE 29.2 Wealth Inequality (Capital Income), 2011 The decline of American manufacturing and the expansion of the low-wage service sector, combined with the rise of high-tech industries and unregulated investment banking, led to growing disparities of wealth in the early twenty-first century. Disparities exist even within the top 20 percentile, as the top 1 percent controlled more than half of all capital income in 2011.