We are the 99%



"Ever since upper-class members attend the How I can Help Make the World Great ceremony, a lot of people are protesting against it, whenever they're the lower class, the working class, the middle class and/or the upper middle class. I remembered the time when the Occupy movement did happen in Wall Street since things went a lot worse for the economy. Now this slogan is gonna get back for sure. I knew this would happen."

--Su Ji-Hoon, How I Can Help Make the World Great (chapter)

We are the 99% is a political slogan widely used and reverse-coined by the Occupy movement from Gore Vidal's famous and original version "the one percent", meaning the nation's wealthiest 1%, to which the 99% reversely correspond. "The 99%" also adopted as part the name of a Tumblr blog page launched in late August 2011 and is a variation on the phrase "We The 99%" from an August 2011 flyer for the New York City General Assembly. A related statistic, the 1%, refers to the top 1% wealthiest people in society that have a disproportionate share of capital, political influence, and the means of production.

The phrase directly refers to the income and wealth inequality in the United States with a concentration of wealth among the top earning 1%. It reflects an opinion that the "99%" are paying the price for the mistakes of a tiny minority within the upper class. As of 2009, all households with incomes less than $343,927 belonged to the lower 99% of the wage earners. However the 1% is not a reference to top 1% of wage earners, it is a reference to the top 1% net worth individuals of which earned wages are only one of many contributing factors.

In When the Cold Breeze Blows Away, it would be happened in during the USRAC War when protesters are angry at the upper-class members for attending the How I Can Help Make the World Great ceremony