Money

The Relationship Between Income and Wealth

Published

6 years ago

December 7, 2016

Jeff Desjardins

Let’s say that your neighbor is a surgeon that makes $250,000 a year. Does that mean he or she is rich?

The answer is “no” – and it turns out that the actual statistical relationship between income and wealth is surprisingly low.

Graphing Income and Wealth

The folks at Don’t Quit Your Day Job did an analysis of federal data on income and net worth, and the results can be summarized with this visualization:

Relationship Between Income and Wealth

The X axis shows annual income, and the Y axis shows net worth. It’s also worth noting that both scales are logarithmic, so they the intervals increase by a factor of 10x.

The above data has some correlation, but it’s not as much as you’d likely think.

The R-squared value, a measure used to express the relationship between two sets of data, is only 33%. In other words, one variable only helps to “explain” the other about a third of the time, which suggests just a partial relationship between income and net worth.

Although this minimal relationship may seem counterintuitive to some people, it all makes more sense when you consider that income is just one factor that could contribute to overall net worth. Income is important, but spending habits, savings, and investments are also important to building wealth over time.

The Age and Experience Factor

Now, here’s the really interesting part: income is a better predictor for the wealth of people in certain age groups, and a worse predictor for others.

Here’s another chart from DQYDJ:

Correlation for income and wealth for different age groups

For younger people, there seems to be hardly any relationship between income and wealth. Later on, in the late-30s, the relationship seems to peak. During this age period, income is actually a very good predictor of someone’s net worth.

Finally, from there, the relationship seems to decrease over time. The older you get, the less likely income is a useful predictor of actual wealth.

This makes sense for a variety of reasons, but perhaps one of the more important one is how that money is spent. People that are disciplined savers and smart investors will increase their net worth over time, regardless of their income.

Related Topics:wealth income correlation net worth money

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Economy

Charted: Public Trust in the Federal Reserve

Public trust in the Federal Reserve chair has hit its lowest point in 20 years. Get the details in this infographic.

Published

5 days ago

May 23, 2023

Marcus Lu

The Briefing

Gallup conducts an annual poll to gauge the U.S. public’s trust in the Federal Reserve
After rising during the COVID-19 pandemic, public trust has fallen to a 20-year low

Charted: Public Trust in the Federal Reserve

Each year, Gallup conducts a survey of American adults on various economic topics, including the country’s central bank, the Federal Reserve.

More specifically, respondents are asked how much confidence they have in the current Fed chairman to do or recommend the right thing for the U.S. economy. We’ve visualized these results from 2001 to 2023 to see how confidence levels have changed over time.

Methodology and Results

The data used in this infographic is also listed in the table below. Percentages reflect the share of respondents that have either a “great deal” or “fair amount” of confidence.

Year	Fed chair	% Great deal or Fair amount
2023	Jerome Powell	36%
2022	Jerome Powell	43%
2021	Jerome Powell	55%
2020	Jerome Powell	58%
2019	Jerome Powell	50%
2018	Jerome Powell	45%
2017	Janet Yellen	45%
2016	Janet Yellen	38%
2015	Janet Yellen	42%
2014	Janet Yellen	37%
2013	Ben Bernanke	42%
2012	Ben Bernanke	39%
2011	Ben Bernanke	41%
2010	Ben Bernanke	44%
2009	Ben Bernanke	49%
2008	Ben Bernanke	47%
2007	Ben Bernanke	50%
2006	Ben Bernanke	41%
2005	Alan Greenspan	56%
2004	Alan Greenspan	61%
2003	Alan Greenspan	65%
2002	Alan Greenspan	69%
2001	Alan Greenspan	74%

Data for 2023 collected April 3-25, with this statement put to respondents: “Please tell me how much confidence you have [in the Fed chair] to recommend the right thing for the economy.”

We can see that trust in the Federal Reserve has fluctuated significantly in recent years.

For example, under Alan Greenspan, trust was initially high due to the relative stability of the economy. The burst of the dotcom bubble—which some attribute to Greenspan’s easy credit policies—resulted in a sharp decline.

On the flip side, public confidence spiked during the COVID-19 pandemic. This was likely due to Jerome Powell’s decisive actions to provide support to the U.S. economy throughout the crisis.

Measures implemented by the Fed include bringing interest rates to near zero, quantitative easing (buying government bonds with newly-printed money), and emergency lending programs to businesses.

Confidence Now on the Decline

After peaking at 58%, those with a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the Fed chair have tumbled to 36%, the lowest number in 20 years.

This is likely due to Powell’s hard stance on fighting post-pandemic inflation, which has involved raising interest rates at an incredible speed. While these rate hikes may be necessary, they also have many adverse effects:

Negative impact on the stock market
Increases the burden for those with variable-rate debts
Makes mortgages and home buying less affordable

Higher rates have also prompted many U.S. tech companies to shrink their workforces, and have been a factor in the regional banking crisis, including the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank.

Where does this data come from?

Source: Gallup (2023)

Data Notes: Results are based on telephone interviews conducted April 3-25, 2023, with a random sample of –1,013—adults, ages 18+, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on this sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. See source for details.