Whiskey A-Go-Go, a Montana whiskey sampling party, is April 11, featuring whiskey tastings from five Montana distilleries and music by DJ 5 Star from 5 to 8 p.m. in the Mountain Village plaza at Big Sky.

The Montana area distilleries represented will be RoughStock (Bozeman), Willie’s (Ennis), Bozeman Spirits, HeadFrame (Butte America), and WildRye (Bozeman).

RoughStock Montana Whiskey is Montana’s first legal distillery since Prohibition and the first to make whiskey in Montana in more than 100 years. Their process highlights the locally grown grains without an overbearing oak influence.

Willie’s Distillery uses a copper pot still made by Bavarian Holstein Stills from Germany. Willie’s uses Montana grains, select yeast, and Montana water. Special ingredients are wild Montana honey or native berries and botanicals.

 Bozeman Spirits Distillery is known for its blended Montana 1889 Whiskey, which was named after the date Montana became a state.

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Montana’s middle class is shrinking as the income divide widens between the upper and lower classes.

The percentage of Montanans with middle-class incomes fell from 51.3 percent in 2000 to 46.6 percent in 2013, according to a report by the Pew Charitable Trusts. The drop was more than neighboring states Wyoming and Idaho, where the percentage of households earning between 67 and 200 percent of their state’s median income was nearly flat.

Median household income in Montana in 2013 was $46,972.

“The increase in income inequality in the United States has been well documented, and the hard question is: One, what is it caused by, and two, what can we do about it?” said Barbara Wagner, Montana Department of Labor chief economist.

Creating an educated workforce is part of the solution, Wagner said. The number of Montana jobs requiring more than a high school education is increasing, though the state lags behind the national demand for college-educated workers. There are still a lot of trade jobs in Montana that pay $50,000 or more annually.

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