What does it take to be wealthy in 2023? A million dollars in the bank? Two million? How about a salary in the high six figures?
In different ways, the average American family feels both wealthier and poorer now than a few years ago.
Median household wealth hit $192,900 last year, up 37% since 2019, the largest jump in the history of the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances.
But inflation also hit a 40-year high in 2022, and in 2023, interest rates surged to the steepest mark in 22 years, developments that left everyone’s purse feeling a bit lighter.
Many Americans still strive for that first million. Yet, thanks to inflation, an item that cost $1 million in 2019 would cost $1.2 million today.
In a recent survey of 2,000 Americans by the personal finance site LendingTree, 59% said they do not believe they will ever become wealthy.
Here, then, are five numbers that illustrate what it means to be wealthy in America today:
$2.6 million
That lofty sum represents the net worth of the median American family in the upper 10% of income, a range that most of us would deem wealthy. The figure comes from the federal Survey of Consumer Finances, released Oct. 17.
“Generally speaking, we might consider the top 10% of households by income as wealthy,” said Cristian deRitis, deputy chief economist at Moody’s Analytics.
Household wealth swelled at a record pace between 2019 and 2022. The government handed out an unprecedented series of stimulus checks. Lockdowns kept…
