Stories

America's top 1% has almost as much wealth as middle, upper-middle classes combined

Stacks of money
Photo: Phil Ashley/Getty Images

The top 1% of American households have almost as much wealth as the middle- and upper-middle classes combined, reports Bloomberg.

Why it matters: The richer the 1% becomes, the more opportunities they have, per Bloomberg. A large portion of their wealth comes from "huge returns in the stock market in the past decade, to the point that they now control more than half of the equity in the U.S. public and private companies," according to Federal Reserve data.

By the numbers: The "upper-most bracket grew by $650 billion in the second quarter of 2019, while Americans in the 50th to 90th percentiles saw a $210 billion gain," writes Bloomberg.

  • The richest group had assets of about $35.4 trillion in the second quarter while the tens of millions in the 5oth to 90th percentile held less than $36.9 trillion, per Bloomberg.
  • Americans in the 90th and 99th percentile sill have the largest share of the wealth, with $42.6 trillion in holdings, notes Bloomberg.

Go deeper:

Wealth