Understanding the Unequal Post-Great Recession Wealth Recovery for American Families

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sisi Zhang ◽  
Shuaizhang Feng
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Wealth Distribution ◽  
Wealth Accumulation ◽  
Survey Of Consumer Finances ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Consumer Finances ◽  
Level Data ◽  
Family Level ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Race Ethnicity

AbstractThe wealth of US families had not returned to its prerecession level by 2013, six years after the onset of the Great Recession. This article provides a comprehensive analysis of this slow and uneven episode of wealth recovery, using family-level data from the Survey of Consumer Finances 1989–2013. Both descriptive results and regressions controlling for life cycle wealth accumulation show that families of color and less-educated families are falling behind in wealth recovery because their wealth portfolios are concentrated in housing, which has recovered very slowly. The decomposition results suggest that homeownership plays a significant role in explaining wealth disparity by race, ethnicity, and education at the mean and bottom of the wealth distribution. Understanding the uneven wealth recovery has important implications for redesigning asset-related policies and narrowing wealth gaps.

scholarly journals Disparities in Wealth Accumulation and Loss from the Great Recession and Beyond

2014 ◽  
Vol 104 (5) ◽  
pp. 240-244 ◽  
Author(s):  
Signe-Mary McKernan ◽  
Caroline Ratcliffe ◽  
Eugene Steuerle ◽  
Sisi Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Housing Market ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Wealth Accumulation ◽  
Survey Of Consumer Finances ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Consumer Finances ◽  
Family Wealth ◽  
Synthetic Cohort ◽  
Pseudo Panel ◽  
The Impact

Using over two decades of Survey of Consumer Finances data and a pseudo-panel technique, we measure the impact of the Great Recession on US family wealth relative to the counterfactual of what wealth would have been given wealth accumulation trajectories. Our synthetic cohort-level models find that the Great Recession reduced average family wealth by 28.5 percent-nearly double the magnitude of previous pre-post mean descriptive estimates and double the magnitude of any previous recession since the 1980s. The housing market was only part of the story; all major wealth components fell as a result of the Great Recession.

Perceived Income Changes, Saving Motives, and Household Savings

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 396-409 ◽  
Author(s):  
Su Hyun Shin ◽  
Kyoung Tae Kim
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
The United States ◽  
Household Savings ◽  
Survey Of Consumer Finances ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Consumer Finances ◽  
Negative Income ◽  
Income Shock ◽  
Saving Decisions

Using the 2007–2009 Survey of Consumer Finances panel dataset, we investigate whether and how changes in perceived income and saving motives are related to demand for household savings in the United States after the Great Recession. Households that perceive their current income as lower, relative to normal years are less likely to save than those who view that their income is the same as the reference point. This result holds only for those who experienced a significant negative income shock during the Great Recession. Among five major saving motives, saving for an emergency is an important factor in explaining the likelihood of saving. This study suggests that financial planners and educators should pay close attention to the role of households’ income perception and saving motives and should account for the resulting potential psychological biases in households’ saving decisions.

Income Uncertainty and Household Stock Ownership During the Great Recession

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 383-395 ◽  
Author(s):  
Su Hyun Shin ◽  
Kyoung Tae Kim
Keyword(s):  
Instrumental Variables ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Negative Relationship ◽  
Stock Ownership ◽  
Survey Of Consumer Finances ◽  
Income Uncertainty ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Consumer Finances ◽  
Before And After ◽  
The Relationship

Using the 2007–2009 Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) panel dataset, this study investigated the relationship between subjective income risks and stock ownership of 2,386 households with a working head before and after the Great Recession. We used subjective income uncertainty as a proxy for subjective income risks. A two-stage least squares (2SLS) estimation with an instrumental variables (IV) approach was used to reduce potential selection bias. The results suggested that households that were more likely to face subjective income uncertainty were less likely to hold stock assets in their portfolios. We confirmed this negative relationship between subjective income risks and stock ownership using tests of robustness.

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