Look more carefully at my wording - most of the time, when you hear a news report using wording like "the income of the average family..." (as opposed to "avera

Look more carefully at my wording - most of the time, when you hear a news report using wording like "the income of the average family..." (as opposed to "average income"), you're hearing a median value, not a mean. The newsreader probably doesn't know it, but this is precisely because the median is less skewed by that long tail you mention.