The BLS figures you cite only include full-time hourly and salaried workers. These are the upper crust of employment in America. My figure comes from payroll

The BLS figures you cite only include full-time hourly and salaried workers. These are the upper crust of employment in America. My figure comes from payrolls reported to the Social Security Administration: http://www.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/netcomp.cgi?year=2011 http://www.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/netcomp.cgi?year=2011 "By definition, 50 percent of wage earners had net compensation less than or equal to the median wage, which is estimated to be $26,965.43 for 2011." 28k was a peak value from a graph that adjusted old dollar values to present dollars. (The SSA data is unadjusted for inflation.)