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The distribution of wealth is a comparison of the wealth of various members or groups in a society. It shows one aspect of economic heterogeneity.

The distribution of wealth differs from the income distribution in that it looks at the economic distribution of ownership of the assets in a society, rather than the current income of members of that society. According to the International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, "the world distribution of wealth is much more unequal than that of income."^[1]

For one set of rankings regarding wealth, see list of countries by wealth per adult.

Definition of wealth

Wealth of an individual is defined as net worth, exposed as: wealth = assets − liabilities

A broader definition of wealth, which is rarely used in the measurement of wealth inequality, also includes human capital. For example, the United Nations definition of inclusive wealth is a monetary measure which includes the sum of natural, human and physical assets.^[2][3]

The relation between wealth, income, and expenses is: :change of wealth = saving = income − consumption(expenses). If an individual has a large income but also large expenses, the net effect of that income on her or his wealth could be small or even negative.
The term wealth should not be confused with rich. These two terms describe different but related things. Wealth consists of those items of economic value that an individual owns, while rich is an inflow of items of economic value. (See Stock and flow.)

Conceptual framework

There are many ways in which the distribution of wealth can be analyzed. One common-used example is to compare the amount of the
wealth of individual at say 99 percentile relative to the wealth of the median (or 50th) percentile. This is P99/P50, which is one of the potential Kuznets ratios. Another common measure is the ratio of total amount of wealth in the hand of top say 1% of the wealth distribution over the total wealth in the economy. In many societies, the richest ten percent control more than half of the total wealth.

Pareto Distribution has often been used to mathematically quantify the distribution of wealth at the right tail (the wealth of very rich). In fact, the tail of wealth distribution, similar to the one of income distribution, behave like Pareto distribution but with ticker tail.

Wealth over people (WOP) curves are a visually compelling way to show the distribution of wealth in a nation. WOP curves are modified distribution of wealth curves. The vertical and horizontal scales each show percentages from zero to one hundred. We imagine all the households in a nation being sorted from richest to poorest. They are then shrunk down and lined up (richest at the left) along the horizontal scale. For any particular household, its point on the curve represents how their wealth compares (as a proportion) to the average wealth of the richest percentile. For any nation, the average wealth of the richest 1/100 of households is the topmost point on the curve (people, 1%; wealth, 100%) or (p=1, w=100) or (1, 100). In the real world two points on the WOP curve are always known before any statistics are gathered. These are the topmost point (1, 100) by definition, and the rightmost point (poorest people, lowest wealth) or (p=100, w=0) or (100, 0). This unfortunate rightmost point is given because there are always at least one percent of households (incarcerated, long term illness, etc.) with no wealth at all. Given that the topmost and rightmost points are fixed ... our interest lies in the form of the WOP curve between them. There are two extreme possible forms of the curve. The first is the "perfect communist" WOP. It is a straight line from the leftmost (maximum wealth) point horizontally across the people scale to p=99. Then it drops vertically to wealth = 0 at (p=100, w=0).

The other extreme is the "perfect tyranny" form. It starts on the left at the Tyrant's maximum wealth of 100%. It then immediately drops to zero at p=2, and continues at zero horizontally across the rest of the people. That is, the tyrant and his friends (the top percentile) own all the nation's wealth. All other citizens are serfs or slaves. An obvious intermediate form is a straight line connecting the left/top point to the right/bottom point. In such a "Diagonal" society a household in the richest percentile would have just twice the wealth of a family in the median (50th) percentile. Such a society is compelling to many (especially the poor). In fact it is a comparison to a diagonal society that is the basis for the Gini values used as a measure of the disequity in a particular economy. These Gini values (40.8 in 2007) show the United States to be the third most dis-equitable economy of all the developed nations (behind Denmark and Switzerland).

More sophisticated models have also been proposed.^[4]

Available Data

Wealth surveys

Many countries have national wealth surveys, for example:

• The British Wealth and Assets Survey
  


• The Italian Survey on Household Income and Wealth
  


• The euro area Household Finance and Consumption Survey
  


• The US Survey of Consumer Finances
  


• The Canadian Survey of Financial Security
  


• The German Armuts- und Reichtumsbericht der Bundesregierung
  

Administrative data

Inequality

Share of wealth globally by year, as seen by Oxfam,^[5] based on the net worth^[6]

The gap between the rich and poor can be illustrated by the fact that the three wealthiest individuals in the world have assets that exceed those of the poorest 10 percent of the world's population.^{[citation needed]} The net worth of the world's billionaires increased from less than $1 trillion in 2000 to over $7 trillion in 2015 so the gap is increasing dramatically.

Wealth distribution pyramid

Personal wealth varies across adults for many reasons. Some individuals with little wealth may be at early stages in their careers, with little chance or motivation to accumulate assets. Others may have suffered business setbacks or personal misfortunes, or live in parts of the world where opportunities for wealth creation are severely limited. At the other end of the spectrum, there are individuals who have acquired a large wealth through different ways. In Western countries, the most typical way of becoming wealthy is entrepreneurship (estimated three quarters of new millionaires). Other typical way (covering most of the remaining quarter) is pursuing a career with the end goal of becoming a C-level executive, a leading professional in a specific field (such as a doctor, lawyer, engineer) or a top corporate sales person. Only around 1% of new millionaires acquire their wealth via other means such as professional sports, show business, art, inventions, investing, inheritance or lottery.

The wealth pyramid below was prepared by Credit Suisse in 2013. Personal assets were calculated in net worth, meaning wealth would be negated by having any mortgages.^[6] It has a large base of low wealth holders, alongside upper tiers occupied by progressively fewer people. In 2013 Credit-suisse estimate that 3.2 billion individuals – more than two thirds of adults in the world – have wealth below US$10,000. A further one billion(adult population) fall within the 10,000 – US$100,000 range. While the average wealth holding is modest in the base and middle segments of the pyramid, their total wealth amounts to US$40 trillion, underlining the potential for novel consumer products and innovative financial services targeted
at this often neglected segment.^[7]

The pyramid shows that:

• half of the world's net wealth belongs to the top 1%,


• top 10% of adults hold 85%, while the bottom 90% hold the remaining 15% of the world's total wealth,


• top 30% of adults hold 97% of the total wealth.

Pyramid of global wealth distribution in 2013^[7]

Wealth distribution in 2012

According to the OECD in 2012 the top 0.6% of world population (consisting of adults with more than US$1 million in assets) or the 42 million richest people in the world held 39.3% of world wealth. The next 4.4% (311 million people) held 32.3% of world wealth. The bottom 95% held 28.4% of world wealth. The large gaps of the report get by the Gini index to 0.893, and are larger than gaps in global income inequality, measured in 2009 at 0.38.^[8] For example, in 2012 the bottom 60% of the world population held same wealth in 2012 as the people on Forbes' Richest list consisting of 1,226 richest billionaires of the world.

21st century

At the end of the 20th century, wealth was concentrated among the G8 and Western industrialized nations, along with several Asian and OPEC nations.

Wealth inequality

A study by the World Institute for Development Economics Research at United Nations University reports that the richest 1% of adults alone owned 40% of global assets in the year 2000, and that the richest 10% of adults accounted for 85% of the world total. The bottom half of the world adult population owned 1% of global wealth.^[9] Moreover, another study found that the richest 2% own more than half of global household assets.^[10]

Real estate

While sizeable numbers of households own no land, few have no income. For example, the top 10% of land owners (all corporations) in Baltimore, Maryland own 58% of the taxable land value. The bottom 10% of those who own any land own less than 1% of the total land value.^[11] This form of analysis as well as Gini coefficient analysis has been used to support land value taxation.

Credit Suisse Report – Wealth Distribution & Gini (2013)

This table was created from information provided by the Credit Suisse, Research Institute's "Global Wealth Databook", published 2013.^[12]

Country	Adults (1,000s)	Wealth per adult (USD)		Proportion of adults (%) by wealth range (USD)					Gini (%)
		Mean	Median	Under 10k	10k – 100k	100k – 1M	Over 1M	Total
Denmark	4,190	255,066	57,675	39.5	17	37.8	5.7	100	107.7
Russian Federation	110,365	10,976	871	93.7	5.6	0.6	0.1	100	93.1
Ukraine	35,912	3,413	419	97.4	2.3	0.2	0	100	90
Kazakhstan	10,958	7,161	1,176	93.1	6.3	0.6	0.1	100	86.7
Lebanon	2,953	30,868	6,076	66.8	29.8	3.2	0.3	100	86.3
United States of America	239,279	301,140	44,911	30.7	33	30.7	5.5	100	85.1
Zimbabwe	6,690	2,913	479	93.9	5.8	0.3	0	100	83.8
Turkey	51,687	25,909	5,326	67	30.3	2.5	0.2	100	83.7
South Africa	31,034	19,613	3,051	72.3	24.9	2.6	0.1	100	83.6
Hong Kong	6,052	153,312	32,384	30.3	49.7	18.3	1.7	100	83.1
Philippines	56,730	8,799	1,849	88.1	11.1	0.8	0.1	100	82.9
Indonesia	157,869	11,839	2,393	81.1	17.6	1.3	0.1	100	82.8
Thailand	49,642	7,772	1,855	90.5	8.8	0.6	0	100	82.6
Venezuela	18,991	6,900	1,505	90.9	8.5	0.6	0	100	82.5
Brazil	135,385	23,278	5,117	66.6	30.5	2.7	0.2	100	82.1
Malaysia	18,382	27,007	5,831	61.4	35.3	3.1	0.2	100	81.5
Chile	12,461	49,032	11,742	45	48	6.6	0.4	100	81.4
India	767,612	76,092	1,040	94.4	5.2	0.3	0	100	81.3
Switzerland	6,101	512,562	95,916	5.2	46	38.8	10	100	80.6
Sweden	7,299	299,441	52,677	15.6	48.3	29.2	6.9	100	80.3
Egypt	52,710	7,285	1,852	90.4	9	0.6	0	100	80.3
Nigeria	80,462	3,620	894	94.9	4.9	0.3	0	100	80
Colombia	30,464	26,222	6,228	60.2	35.8	3.9	0.2	100	79.7
Seychelles	54	60,003	14,617	40	50	9.2	0.8	100	79.6
Argentina	28,265	15,638	4,032	72.1	26.1	1.7	0.1	100	79.6
Saudi Arabia	16,694	37,346	9,772	53.3	41.1	5.3	0.3	100	79.3
Namibia	1,256	19,899	4,531	67.5	28.3	4.2	0.1	100	78.7
Israel	4,947	137,351	38,164	30	44.8	23.7	1.5	100	78.7
Comoros	388	2,872	670	93.8	6.1	0.2	0	100	78.7
Cyprus	694	119,568	34,874	23.8	56.3	18.6	1.4	100	78.3
Mexico	73,380	35,872	9,718	53.5	40.6	5.7	0.3	100	78
Norway	3,733	380,473	92,859	19.4	32.5	40.6	7.5	100	77.8
Austria	6,761	203,931	57,450	28.2	31.8	37	3	100	77.8
Libya	4,291	28,397	6,563	58.1	35.7	6	0.1	100	77.7
Botswana	1,181	10,348	2,649	81	17.6	1.4	0	100	77.2
Germany	67,068	192,232	49,370	29	33.3	35.1	2.6	100	77.1
Haiti	5,813	3,532	960	92.3	7.5	0.2	0	100	76.1
Angola	9,273	14,708	3,934	69.1	28.8	2.1	0	100	75.6
Central African Republic	2,370	800	241	99.1	0.9	0	0	100	74.8
Bolivia	5,800	4,604	1,368	89.3	10.4	0.3	0	100	74.4
Zambia	6,151	1,817	548	96.8	3.2	0	0	100	74.1
Czech Republic	8,437	44,975	15,541	40	53.2	6.4	0.3	100	74
Singapore	3,955	281,764	90,466	20	34.2	41.4	4.4	100	73.9
Kuwait	2,291	119,101	42,897	21.8	55.5	21.5	1.2	100	73.8
Poland	30,255	26,056	9,109	55	41.5	3.3	0.1	100	73.7
Taiwan	18,359	151,752	53,336	22.5	45.1	30.8	1.7	100	73.6
Netherlands	12,914	185,588	83,631	23.3	30.9	43.6	2.2	100	73.2
Belize	188	9,998	3,130	76.3	22.6	1.1	0	100	73.1
Suriname	344	14,250	4,544	68.8	29.6	1.6	0	100	73
Nicaragua	3,424	3,432	1,147	92.5	7.3	0.1	0	100	73
Romania	16,692	14,044	5,137	69.3	29.2	1.4	0.1	100	73
Lesotho	1,079	3,457	1,105	92.4	7.5	0.1	0	100	72.9
Paraguay	3,910	10,934	3,726	73.2	25.6	1.3	0	100	72.8
Swaziland	628	4,360	1,393	90	9.8	0.2	0	100	72.7
Panama	2,322	22,292	7,509	57.3	38.5	4.2	0	100	72.7
Rwanda	5,306	723	245	99.3	0.7	0	0	100	72.7
Sao Tome and Principe	86	2,721	959	94.3	5.7	0.1	0	100	72.7
Canada	27,173	251,034	90,252	30	21.5	44.9	3.7	100	72.7
South Korea	38,350	79,475	30,938	25.3	59.5	14.5	0.7	100	72.6
Papua New Guinea	3,752	8,470	2,821	81.1	18	0.8	0	100	72.4
Cape Verde	295	16,313	5,478	65	32.5	2.5	0	100	72.3
Antigua and Barbuda	63	19,011	6,281	58.8	38.3	3	0	100	72.2
Costa Rica	3,246	28,124	9,532	54.1	40.2	5.7	0.1	100	72.2
Dominica	50	24,086	8,349	55	40.3	4.7	0.1	100	72
St. Kitts and Nevis	34	23,613	8,185	56.3	39.1	4.6	0.1	100	71.9
St. Vincent and the Grenadines	71	10,196	3,492	73.8	25.1	1.1	0	100	71.9
Grenada	67	14,473	5,017	67.5	30.7	1.7	0	100	71.9
New Zealand	3,234	182,548	76,607	25.6	34.1	38.1	2.3	100	71.8
Ecuador	8,723	12,350	4,403	69.8	28.8	1.4	0	100	71.4
El Salvador	3,738	12,039	4,483	70	28.7	1.3	0	100	71
Ireland	3,488	183,804	75,573	20.9	36.5	40.4	2.2	100	70.9
Kenya	20,757	2,843	1,049	94.2	5.7	0.1	0	100	70.9
Oman	1,872	48,415	18,152	40	47.8	12	0.2	100	70.8
Peru	18,865	18,227	6,705	58.5	38.9	2.6	0	100	70.8
Gambia	908	864	324	99.2	0.8	0	0	100	70.8
Congo-Brazzaville	2,024	3,892	1,420	91.2	8.6	0.1	0	100	70.8
United Arab Emirates	3,777	126,791	51,882	20	50.6	28.2	1.3	100	70.5
Qatar	1,278	153,294	58,237	25	38.3	35	1.7	100	70.5
Portugal	8,614	89,074	38,846	25.8	54.8	18.7	0.8	100	70.1
Mozambique	11,441	811	313	99.3	0.7	0	0	100	70
Jamaica	1,719	11,401	4,393	70	28.8	1.2	0	100	69.9
Uruguay	2,400	47,002	17,998	39.6	48.3	11.9	0.2	100	69.8
Uganda	15,107	750	294	99.4	0.6	0	0	100	69.6
DR Congo	31,854	321	124	99.9	0.1	0	0	100	69.6
China	998,254	22,230	8,023	58.4	39.1	2.4	0.1	100	69.5
Madagascar	10,359	448	177	99.8	0.2	0	0	100	69.4
Guyana	474	3,801	1,506	91.6	8.3	0.1	0	100	69.2
Fiji	523	6,473	2,630	85	14.6	0.4	0	100	69
France	48,124	295,933	141,850	21.7	22.9	50.8	4.6	100	69
Barbados	200	22,289	8,108	55	41.5	3.5	0	100	69
Eritrea	2,781	2,125	875	96.3	3.7	0	0	100	68.9
Macedonia, FYR	1,561	11,543	4,743	69.3	29.6	1.1	0	100	68.8
Sierra Leone	2,897	681	273	99.6	0.4	0	0	100	68.8
Ghana	13,501	1,811	743	97.7	2.3	0	0	100	68.6
St. Lucia	119	13,087	5,296	66.3	32.5	1.2	0	100	68.5
Tunisia	7,452	21,084	8,823	55	41.5	3.5	0	100	68.2
Gabon	869	21,860	9,240	55	41.3	3.7	0	100	68.2
Solomon Islands	298	9,868	4,261	73.8	25.3	1	0	100	68.1
Morocco	21,355	11,398	4,750	70	28.9	1.1	0	100	68.1
Côte d'Ivoire	11,501	2,640	1,104	95	4.9	0.1	0	100	68.1
Sri Lanka	14,326	5,033	2,101	87.9	11.9	0.2	0	100	68
Turkmenistan	3,352	36,570	15,305	40	52.1	7.8	0.1	100	68
Georgia	3,172	21,640	9,178	54.7	41.8	3.5	0	100	68
Togo	3,693	2,450	1,049	95.6	4.3	0	0	100	67.9
United Kingdom	48,220	243,570	111,524	18	28.8	50	3.2	100	67.7
Mauritania	1,832	1,967	865	97	3	0	0	100	67.7
Burkina Faso	7,721	1,273	543	98.7	1.3	0	0	100	67.7
Djibouti	508	3,465	1,488	92.8	7.2	0.1	0	100	67.5
Chad	5,485	1,131	483	99	1	0	0	100	67.5
Trinidad and Tobago	987	15,088	6,459	60	38.5	1.5	0	100	67.4
Malawi	7,417	207	89	100	0	0	0	100	67.3
Guinea	5,301	882	380	99.4	0.6	0	0	100	67.3
Iceland	253	211,592	104,733	20	30	47.3	2.7	100	67.3
Tonga	54	15,905	7,217	58.8	39.8	1.5	0	100	67.2
Senegal	6,423	2,597	1,125	95.3	4.7	0	0	100	67.2
Cameroon	10,459	2,603	1,115	95.2	4.8	0	0	100	67.2
Vanuatu	138	6,068	2,753	85	14.7	0.3	0	100	67.1
Benin	4,733	3,187	1,398	93.6	6.3	0.1	0	100	67.1
Samoa	92	34,537	15,132	40	53	6.9	0.1	100	67
Cambodia	9,151	2,644	1,155	95	4.9	0	0	100	67
Yemen	12,192	4,951	2,193	88.3	11.6	0.2	0	100	66.8
Iran	53,270	8,727	3,846	75	24.4	0.6	0	100	66.8
Liberia	2,118	2,173	987	96.5	3.5	0	0	100	66.7
Tanzania	22,038	951	423	99.3	0.7	0	0	100	66.6
Laos	3,618	5,393	2,411	86.7	13.1	0.2	0	100	66.5
Lithuania	2,537	23,411	10,635	47.5	48.5	3.9	0	100	66.5
Myanmar	34,180	2,214	941	97	3	0	0	100	66.4
Finland	4,195	171,821	95,095	29	22.3	47.2	1.6	100	66.4
Maldives	210	5,556	2,480	85	14.8	0.2	0	100	66.3
Bahamas	242	41,106	17,842	35	55.9	9	0.1	100	66.2
Spain	37,206	123,997	63,306	17.4	52.4	29	1.1	100	66.1
Mongolia	1,855	14,214	6,433	61.1	37.6	1.3	0	100	66.1
Syrian Arab Republic	13,352	7,073	3,198	82.7	16.9	0.4	0	100	66
Latvia	1,787	24,285	11,338	45	50.9	4	0	100	66
Greece	9,105	102,971	53,937	20.4	53.7	25.1	0.8	100	65.9
Jordan	3,858	14,364	6,589	60.3	38.3	1.4	0	100	65.9
Kyrgyz Republic	3,568	5,385	2,432	85.9	13.9	0.2	0	100	65.9
Viet Nam	61,765	4,857	2,215	87.8	12	0.2	0	100	65.8
West Bank and Gaza	1,739	8,979	4,200	73.1	26.3	0.6	0	100	65.8
Equatorial Guinea	365	19,525	9,130	55	42.6	2.4	0	100	65.8
Bosnia and Herzegovina	2,985	11,173	5,139	68.2	30.9	0.9	0	100	65.8
Luxembourg	390	315,240	182,768	15	22.5	57	5.5	100	65.7
Estonia	1,055	33,701	15,724	40	53.3	6.6	0.1	100	65.7
Guinea-Bissau	836	424	199	99.9	0.1	0	0	100	65.7
Albania	2,237	9,450	4,451	72.7	26.6	0.7	0	100	65.6
Niger	7,014	937	434	99.3	0.7	0	0	100	65.5
Algeria	23,982	10,100	4,673	70	29.2	0.7	0	100	65.5
Sudan	23,811	1,291	595	98.9	1.1	0	0	100	65.4
Burundi	4,729	293	137	99.9	0.1	0	0	100	65.2
Azerbaijan	6,276	16,344	7,721	57.1	41.4	1.5	0	100	65.1
Croatia	3,498	26,551	12,639	41.2	54.1	4.7	0	100	65.1
Italy	49,117	241,383	138,653	20	20.5	56.5	3	100	65
Mali	6,464	955	455	99.4	0.6	0	0	100	64.7
Moldova	2,692	3,854	1,874	91.8	8.1	0.1	0	100	64.7
Nepal	17,273	1,998	951	97.7	2.3	0	0	100	64.7
Bangladesh	104,135	1,894	908	97.9	2.1	0	0	100	64.6
Mauritius	935	37,308	19,247	40	52.5	7.4	0.1	100	64.5
Hungary	7,915	28,379	14,068	40	55	4.9	0	100	64
Armenia	2,263	5,613	2,793	85.5	14.3	0.2	0	100	63.9
Tajikistan	4,022	3,168	1,581	94.3	5.7	0.1	0	100	63.8
Pakistan	106,365	4,248	2,106	90.8	9	0.1	0	100	63.8
Ethiopia	42,750	411	207	99.9	0.1	0	0	100	63.6
Australia	16,617	402,578	219,505	6.9	23.7	62.6	6.8	100	63.6
Japan	104,315	216,694	110,294	9.2	37.7	50.6	2.5	100	63.5
Montenegro	467	21,340	10,929	45	52.6	2.4	0	100	63.4
Belgium	8,387	255,573	148,141	17.4	22.1	57.3	3.2	100	62.6
Serbia	7,527	15,175	7,978	56.8	42	1.3	0	100	62.5
Bulgaria	5,991	16,818	8,825	55.2	43.4	1.4	0	100	62.5
Belarus	7,543	2,407	1,271	96.8	3.1	0	0	100	62.2
Malta	330	71,448	42,898	18.8	65	15.9	0.3	100	59.5
Bahrain	571	44,822	26,675	28.7	60	11.2	0	100	58.5
Brunei Darussalam	286	51,373	31,527	26.2	58.7	15	0	100	58.5
Slovenia	1,655	64,067	44,932	19.4	60.6	19.9	0.1	100	53.5
Slovakia	4,303	27,224	20,740	19.8	77.8	2.4	0	100	44.7

In the United States

According to PolitiFact, in 2011 the 400 wealthiest Americans "have more wealth than half of all Americans combined."^{[14][15][16][17]}Inherited wealth may help explain why many Americans who have become rich may have had a "substantial head start".^[18][19] In September 2012, according to the Institute for Policy Studies, "over 60 percent" of the Forbes richest 400 Americans "grew up in substantial privilege".^[20]

In 2007, the richest 1% of the American population owned 34.6% of the country's total wealth (excluding human capital), and the next 19% owned 50.5%. The top 20% of Americans owned 85% of the country's wealth and the bottom 80% of the population owned 15%. From 1922 to 2010, the share of the top 1% varied from 19.7% to 44.2%, the big drop being associated with the drop in the stock market in the late 1970s. Ignoring the period where the stock market was depressed (1976–1980) and the period when the stock market was overvalued (1929), the share of wealth of the richest 1% remained extremely stable, at about a third of the total wealth.^[21] Financial inequality was greater than inequality in total wealth, with the top 1% of the population owning 42.7%, the next 19% of Americans owning 50.3%, and the bottom 80% owning 7%.^[22] However, after the Great Recession which started in 2007, the share of total wealth owned by the top 1% of the population grew from 34.6% to 37.1%, and that owned by the top 20% of Americans grew from 85% to 87.7%. The Great Recession also caused a drop of 36.1% in median household wealth but a drop of only 11.1% for the top 1%, further widening the gap between the 1% and the 99%.^[13][21][22] During the economic expansion between 2002 and 2007, the income of the top 1% grew 10 times faster than the income of the bottom 90%. In this period 66% of total income gains went to the 1%, who in 2007 had a larger share of total income than at any time since 1928.

Dan Ariely and Michael Norton show in a study (2011) that US citizens across the political spectrum significantly underestimate the current US wealth inequality and would prefer a more egalitarian distribution of wealth, raising questions about ideological disputes over issues like taxation and welfare.^[23]

Additional data, charts, and graphs

• 
  Wealth, Income, and Power by G. William Domhoff


• 
  PowerPoint presentation: Inequalities of Development – Lorenz curve and Gini coefficient
  


• The World Distribution of Household Wealth ^[9]
  


• Article on The World Distribution of Household Wealth report.


• The Federal Reserve Board – Survey of Consumer Finances


• Survey of Consumer Finances 1998–2004 charts – pdf


• 
  Survey of Consumer Finances 1998–2004 data
  and resulting Gini indices for mean incomes: 1989: 51.1, 1992: 47.8, 1995: 49.0, 1998: 50.4, 2001: 52.6, 2004: 51.4
  


• Changes in the Distribution of Wealth in the U.S., 1989–2001


• Report on Net Worth and Asset Ownership of Households


• Projections of the Number of Households in the U.S. 1995–2010


• The System of National Accounts (SNA): comparison of U.S. national accounts statistics with those of other countries


• World Trade Organization: Resources


• 
  Champagne Glass infographic of global wealth distribution from Dalton Conley's You May Ask Yourself: An Introduction to Thinking Like a Sociologist textbook which was adapted from the 1992 UNDP original

World distribution of wealth

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  world distribution of wealth by country (PPP)
  

  
  

  
  


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  world distribution of wealth by region (PPP)
  

  
  

  
  


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  world distribution of wealth by country (exchange rates)
  

  
  

  
  


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  world distribution of wealth by region (exchange rates)
  

  
  

  
  

By region

World distribution of financial wealth
In 2007, 147 companies controlled nearly 40 percent of the monetary value of all transnational corporations.^[26]

Wealth concentration

Wealth concentration is a process by which created wealth, under some conditions, can become concentrated by individuals or entities. Those who hold wealth have the means to invest in newly created sources and structures of wealth, or to otherwise leverage the accumulation of wealth, and are thus the beneficiaries of even greater wealth.

Economic conditions

The first necessary condition for the phenomenon of wealth concentration to occur is an unequal initial distribution of wealth. The distribution of wealth throughout the population is often closely approximated by a Pareto distribution, with tails which decay as a power-law in wealth. (See also: Distribution of wealth and Economic inequality). According to PolitiFact and others, the 400 wealthiest Americans had "more wealth than half of all Americans combined."^{[14][15][16][17]}Inherited wealth may help explain why many Americans who have become rich may have had a "substantial head start".^[18][19] In September 2012, according to the Institute for Policy Studies, "over 60 percent" of the Forbes richest 400 Americans "grew up in substantial privilege".^[20]

The second condition is that a small initial inequality must, over time, widen into a larger inequality. This is an example of positive feedback in an economic system. A team from Jagiellonian University produced statistical model economies showing that wealth condensation can occur whether or not total wealth is growing (if it is not, this implies that the poor could become poorer).^[27]

Correlation between being rich and earning more

Given an initial condition in which wealth is unevenly distributed (i.e., a "wealth gap"^[28]), several non-exclusive economic mechanisms for wealth condensation have been proposed:

• A correlation between being rich and being given high paid employment (oligarchy).


• A marginal propensity to consume low enough that high incomes are correlated with people who have already made themselves rich (meritocracy).


• The ability of the rich to influence government disproportionately to their favor thereby increasing their wealth (plutocracy).^[29]
  

In the first case, being wealthy gives one the opportunity to earn more through high paid employment (e.g., by going to elite schools). In the second case, having high paid employment gives one the opportunity to become rich (by saving your money). In the case of plutocracy, the wealthy exert power over the legislative process, which enables them to increase the wealth disparity.^[30] An example of this is the high cost of political campaigning in some countries, in particular in the US (more generally, see also plutocratic finance).

Because these mechanisms are non-exclusive, it is possible for all three explanations to work together for a compounding effect, increasing wealth concentration even further. Obstacles to restoring wage growth might have more to do with the broader dysfunction of a dollar dominated system particular to the US than with the role of the extremely wealthy.^[31]

Counterbalances to wealth concentration include certain forms of taxation, in particular wealth tax, inheritance tax and progressive taxation of income. However, concentrated wealth does not necessarily inhibit wage growth for ordinary workers.^[32]

Markets with social influence

Product recommendations and information about past purchases have been shown to influence consumers choices significantly whether it is for music, movie, book, technological, and other type of products. Social influence often induces a rich-get-richer phenomenon (Matthew effect) where popular products tend to become even more popular.^[33]

Redistribution of wealth and public policy

In many societies, attempts have been made, through property redistribution, taxation, or regulation, to redistribute wealth, sometimes in support of the upper class, and sometimes to diminish economic inequality.

Examples of this practice go back at least to the Roman republic in the third century B.C.,^[34] when laws were passed limiting the amount of wealth or land that could be owned by any one family. Motivations for such limitations on wealth include the desire for equality of opportunity, a fear that great wealth leads to political corruption, to the belief that limiting wealth will gain the political favor of a voting bloc, or fear that extreme concentration of wealth results in rebellion.^[35] Various forms of socialism attempt to diminish the unequal distribution of wealth and thus the conflicts and social problems (see image below) arising from it.^[36]

During the Age of Reason, Francis Bacon wrote "Above all things good policy is to be used so that the treasures and monies in a state be not gathered into a few hands… Money is like fertilizer, not good except it be spread."^[37]

Communism arose as a reaction to a distribution of wealth in which a few lived in luxury while the masses lived in extreme poverty. In the Critique of the Gotha Program, Marx and Engels wrote "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." While the ideas of Marx have nominally been embraced by various states (Russia, Cuba, Vietnam and China in the 20th century), Marxist utopia remains elusive.^[38]

On the other hand, the combination of labor movements, technology, and social liberalism has diminished extreme poverty in the developed world today, though extremes of wealth and poverty continue in the Third World.^[39]

In the Outlook on the Global Agenda 2014 from the World Economic Forum the widening income disparities come second as a worldwide risk.^[40][41]

See also

• Generational accounting


• Kinetic exchange models of markets


• Wealth concentration

References

External links

• U.N. statistics – Distribution of Income and Consumption; wealth and poverty


• Research on the World Distribution of Household Wealth (UNU-WIDER)


• CIA World Factbook: Field Listing – Distribution of family income – Gini index


• 
  Annual income of richest 100 people enough to end global poverty four times over. Oxfam International, 19 January 2013.