Middle class takes financial hit in most US cities this century, by Sam Fleming and Shawn Donnan in the FT.

More than four-fifths of America’s metropolitan areas have seen household incomes decline this century, according to new research that exposes the politically charged reality of middle-class decline at the heart of this year’s presidential election.

[M]edian household incomes, adjusted for the cost of living in the area, grew in just 39 out of 229 metro areas between 1999 and 2014.