My point exactly. And God only knows how much of that trickles off into accounts it should have no business in along the way.

That understanding would be wrong. The USA has a huge middle class- one that would increase if useless regulations and social programs that kept people stuck in poverty were done away with.
Not according to the charts I've seen over the years. The typical First World income-distribution scheme is roughly shaped like () - large and prosperous middle class, hence most of the total wealth in the middle part. The American ones invariably looked much more like the /\ \/ two-pyramid scheme characteristic of the Third World - large, poor underclass, extremely rich top layer.

As for "useless regulations and social programs that kept people stuck in poverty", stuff it. We've had those in abundance for decades over here and what *that* led to is virtual 100% literacy rate, at one brief point the virtual elimination of true poverty, and more prosperous middle class than you can shake a stick at. Heck, all those "useless social programs" were a major helper when people climbed the hill from poorly educated working stiffs to reasonably-comfortable middle-classers...
That your social security system is crap (which by all accounts the American one is) does not mean they all are, or have to be.