Huge Disparity in Share of Total Wealth Gain Since 1983

This material was published by the Economic Policy Institute.

Wealth is now lower for the typical household than it was a generation ago in 1983, while the wealth at the upper end has expanded.  As today’s Snapshot illustrates, the richest 5 percent of households obtained roughly 82 percent of all the nation’s gains in wealth between 1983 and 2009. The bottom 60 percent of households had less wealth in 2009 than in 1983, meaning they did not participate at all in the growth of wealth over this period.