Joseph N Cohen

Queens College of the City University of New York, Sociology, Faculty Member

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Associate Professor of Sociology at the City University of New York, Queens College.

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Renato P. dos Santos

Lutheran University of Brazil

Catherine Barros

Christian Kasumo

John Nofsinger

University of Alaska Anchorage

Hamilton College

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Distribution of Household Net Worth Cohen

Sociologists routinely discuss economic inequality in abstract terms, such as the "rich," "poor,"... more Sociologists routinely discuss economic inequality in abstract terms, such as the "rich," "poor," "working class," "middle class," and so forth. Concretely, what do the finances of these groups look like? Who counts as rich or poor? How many people are actually broke? How much money do rich people have? Pursuing these questions empirically allows us to move past these two-or three-category typologies and towards a richer understanding of how economic resources and opportunities are distributed across society. In this note, I use data from the most recent Survey of Consumer Finances (US Federal Reserve 2023) to explore the univariate distribution of household net worth (or "wealth") across the entire United States. Net worth is the monetary value of a household's assets less the value of its outstanding debts. A household's net worth is the accumulated economic value of their economic property. The figure signals a household's ability to marshal money to meet needs or wants. Though we are all cognizant of the fact that America has rich and poor families (i.e., high-or low-wealth households), we often lack a concrete sense of how much money "rich" or "poor" people have, how many "rich" or "poor" people exist, and where to place situate people (including ourselves) in society's economic hierarchy (Cohen 2017). Empirical estimates of household net worth's univariate distribution can be helpful in these situations because they push us to develop tangible, well-defined, and nonimagined ideas about who has how much in contemporary America. In addition to this analysis, readers may also wish to consult Aladangady et al.'s (2023) estimates published by the Federal Reserve. Readers may notice minor discrepancies between our estimates (on the order of fractions of a percent) and can consult this post to see my attempts to examine, test, and ultimately agree on the rigor of officially sanctioned This analysis replicates Aladangady et al.'s findings using the public-use microdata set, and uses these findings to offer a concrete, data-driven look at the distribution of wealth (and a dimension of general economic inequality) in contemporary America. BASIC CONCEPTS Economic inequality is very complicated. It manifests differently (e.g., income, wealth, opportunity). Economic outcomes and overall well-being often vary across geography and demographic groups, and positive economic outcomes do not automatically translate into better lives. Empirical social scientists deal with these complexities by developing concepts that describe one dimension of a complex idea like inequality, and then using empirical data analysis to establish a sense of how people's fortunes align with that dimension in question. This analysis focuses on household net worth. As mentioned at the outset, net worth (or "wealth," used synonymously here) is the monetary value of a household's owned property, less their debts. A household's owned property is often referred to as its assets and typically includes things like bank

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