Recent trends in wealth inequality among older Americans in two surveys

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Gabor Kezdi ◽  
Margaret Lay ◽  
David Weir
Keyword(s):  
Social Security ◽  
Wealth Inequality ◽  
Health And Retirement Study ◽  
Survey Of Consumer Finances ◽  
Older Americans ◽  
Consumer Finances ◽  
Recent Trends ◽  
Social Security Wealth ◽  
Retirement Study

We document changes in wealth inequality across American households with a member aged 55 or older, comparing data in the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) with that in the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) between 1998 and 2016. We examine net wealth including housing, financial and nonfinancial assets and debt, without the cash value of insurances, DB pensions or Social Security wealth. We find very similar distributions of net wealth in the two surveys between the 25th and 90th percentiles, but substantially higher wealth in the SCF at the top of the distribution. Both surveys show an increase in wealth inequality between 1998 and 2016, first mostly due to increased wealth at the top, and, after 2012, due to an increase in the share of households with very little wealth as well. Both surveys agree that wealth inequality by education and race, already substantial in 1998, increased further by 2016.

scholarly journals Pension and Social Security Wealth in the Health and Retirement Study

10.3386/w5912 ◽  
1997 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Gustman ◽  
Olivia Mitchell ◽  
Andrew Samwick ◽  
Thomas Steinmeier
Keyword(s):  
Social Security ◽  
Health And Retirement Study ◽  
Social Security Wealth ◽  
Retirement Study

scholarly journals Predatory Inclusion and Education Debt: Rethinking the Racial Wealth Gap

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Seamster ◽  
Raphaël Charron-Chénier
Keyword(s):  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Wealth Inequality ◽  
Racial Groups ◽  
Survey Of Consumer Finances ◽  
Racial Wealth Gap ◽  
Consumer Finances ◽  
Educational Debt ◽  
Blacks And Whites ◽  
Education Debt

Analyses of the recent surge in racial wealth inequality have tended to focus on changes in asset holdings. Debt patterns, by contrast, have remained relatively unexplored. Using 2001-2013 data from the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), we show that after peaking in 2007, debt levels for most debt types had returned to pre-financial crisis levels for blacks and whites by 2013. The primary exception to this is education debt, on which this paper focuses. We show that educational debt has increased substantially for blacks relative to whites in the past decade. We also show that this increase in debt is not attributable to differences in educational attainment across racial groups. These trends, we argue, reflect a process of predatory inclusion, where lenders and financial actors offer needed services to black households, but on exploitative terms that limit or eliminate their long-term benefits. Predatory inclusion, we propose, is one of the mechanisms behind the persistence of racial inequality in contemporary markets.

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