Key Points
- The wealth of the top 1% hit a record $44.6 trillion at the end of the fourth quarter.
- All of the gains came from stock holdings thanks to an end-of-year rally.
- Economists say the rising stock market is giving an added boost to consumer spending through what is known as the “wealth effect.”
The wealth of the top 1% hit a record $44.6 trillion at the end of the fourth quarter, as an end-of-year stock rally lifted their portfolios, according to new data from the Federal Reserve.
The total net worth of the top 1%, defined by the Fed as those with wealth over $11 million, increased by $2 trillion in the fourth quarter. All of the gains came from their stock holdings. The value of corporate equities and mutual fund shares held by the top 1% surged to $19.7 trillion from $17.65 trillion the previous quarter.
While their real estate values went up slightly, the value of their privately held businesses declined, essentially canceling out all other gains outside of stocks.
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tHe EcOnOmY iS dOiNg GrEaT
No, the stock market is doing great at making the rich richer. The economy is fucking broken. On purpose. The crushing of the working class to enrich the 1% is capitalism working exactly as intended.
I’m sure the wealth will trickle down any moment now. Been waiting about 40 years now. Must be happening soon.
It only trickles down in blood, dear. And only that you shed. Kill your masters, kill for your masters, or die for them. Those are your options.
And no one will listen to you because America has a stake in the stupidity of its people.
Thank you! Economy is just who does what work and how we hand out the fruits. Money is just a bullshit abstraction they introduced.
We need to reset ownership. If it doesn’t work for you, burn it down. Its what they do.
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Most people don’t have any money to invest at all, much less enough money to safely invest to live on comfortably. Most people live paycheck to paycheck just hoping nothing major comes up like a sudden illness or broken car.
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What? Open for whom? Competition between who?
Not really. The stock market doing great is the result of low interest rates, massive tax cuts for the wealthy and corporation, and the recent covid money printing. All of that money, that the wealthy hoard, needed somewhere to go and it went into assets like stocks and housing.
The solution is to tax the corporations and wealthy. Take that money and put it back into society. For example, by fixing our infrastructure, funding our schools, and medicare for everyone. The beauty of being early in this hyperinflation cycle is that we can make actual policy decisions to reverse course before it is too late.
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You are right, but you are going against the narrative of to this post, hence all the downvotes from the angry mob.
We just shouldn’t allow individuals to have over a billion dollars, just 100% tax on anything over a billion when combined assets exceed that number. Both because there’s no good reason for any one person to have that much money and because as pathetic as American campaign finance laws are it’s a legit national security risk for someone to have that kind of money to throw at their pet causes.
I would lower that to $100 million. I don’t think there’s even a good reason for anyone to be that rich, but if we’re going for a crazy upper limit…
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If you had a billion dollars and never earned a penny more, you would actually find it hard to spend it all before you die. It could probably fully support several generations of your family. I’m totally fine with saying, “Congratulations! You maxed out the money counter in the game of Life!”
We could give them a trophy and everything
I’d be quite content with 999 million dollars.
Buy your lottery tickets…
Aren’t there some billion dollar super yachts out there? There’s always a reason for the stupidity rich to claim they need more.
Ahh, boo hoo. I guess they’ll need to take out a loan like the rest of us plebians.
Of course, repayment of loans for billionaires is entirely optional. Just raise the overdraft fees of the normies to compensate.
We used to have a super high tax rate on the wealthy (91%) in the past, but it got repealed.
Let your house representative know you’d like that to return.
Make it a million, with an M. Adjusted for inflation after inception, and including stock income. I’ve been saying it for years. Good luck convincing those in power who it would actually effect to enact it though.
It is possible to become a millionaire without exploiting others in the same way the 1% do. I would find a limit somewhere in the tens of millions more reasonable
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Fine, I’m willing to compromise, just so that you don’t think I’m a radical or anything. Let’s make it 99,99%.
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“Raises just aren’t in the budget”. Yeah, because the guys at the top took it all.
There’s an argument that any one person controlling that much money is harmful to everyone else. Above $1 billion what can you even spend the money on?
Private planes don’t cost that much. Even a super yacht or the most expensive house in the world cost less. You can buy islands for less.
Once you have a billion dollars you can live off of 4% without touching the principal. You can just blow $40 million every year. No wonder billionaires think they can do anything. They can as long as they don’t spend too much.
Edit: I calculated wrong. They can live off 6% to 9% every year, since they will have to spend all their extra money so it’s not taxed 100% at the end of the year.
That’s $60 - $90 million. Just wasting it every year and replenished by growth the next year. It’s essentially risk-free, unless they pull an Elon and lose billions for no reason.
That spending would actually be really good for the economy. I like this idea better now.
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Society is harmed because these people can buy up news and TV companies, donate unlimited amounts to politicians, and generally fuck with the economy. No one can tell them what to do because they have so much money.
It seems like an aristocracy, which is very un-American. Once people run out of things to buy, how is their life affected by having more money? It essentially appoints them to a job they haven’t earned.
There’s no reason why Elon should run Twitter. He has no experience in Social Media. Imagine someone you work with just purchased their position and didn’t have to interview or know anything about the field. Would you respect that person? Do you think they would do the job well? It would affect you, the company, and your customers negatively.
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Once you have over $100 million dollars, earning money is not a matter of skill. It’s an inevitability. Compound interest will make sure you and your family are wealthy for generations, unless you pull an Elon.
What I’m telling you is many of these people are bad stewards of capital. Gilded Age robber barons sucked for many other reasons, but they at least understood their industry. Carnegie or JP Morgan would have slapped most of these nepo-babies across the face.
Imagine a sports team composed based on the amount of money people have. It would suck because people are not chosen based on skill. That’s how we’re choosing executive leadership in America right now, and it’s honestly stupid.
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Where did that gap of the median 99%'s assets and the assets of the 1% come from? Could it have come from wages that could have been yours if excess profit was based on how much you contributed to the organization’s productivity?
Could you explain what communism is?
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Thanks Reagan, still waiting for it to trickle down you fucking liar.
Milton Freidman is the one who convinced that POS it would work
This POS also taught Milton.
Think we should end all Economists
Nuke Chicago?
No they have really good food and also real people live there too.
Disproportionately well armed real people, which sounds like a solution to me.
So just a tactical one on the campus?
Ask a meteorologist, but that’s my only objection. If they didn’t want fallout in their backyards, I guess they would’ve fixed it themselves at some point in the last century.
If I ever get a time machine, I’ve got a baby to go delete real quick.
The 1% would have hired some other actor…
It should be trickling down any second now. Meanwhile, the Kellogg’s CEO is telling people to eat cereal for dinner because they are poor.
Not to mention that per weight beef is cheaper
“Let them eat Corn Flakes” appears to be Kellogg’s CEO Gary Pilnick’s advice to cash-strapped shoppers who are spending the highest portion of their income on food than at any point in the last 30 years.
In an interview with CNBC last week, WK Kellogg CEO Pilnick said the company was advertising cereal for dinner to consumers looking for more affordable options. “Give chicken the night off,” the ad’s cheery tagline reads.
“The cereal category has always been quite affordable, and it tends to be a great destination when consumers are under pressure,” Pilnick said. “If you think about the cost of cereal for a family versus what they might otherwise do, that’s going to be much more affordable.”
That same guy, further known as “Asshat”, made more than $4M in 2023. What a fuckin asshole.
I wonder what his advice would be on other topics.
“Man, I wish I could buy a house so that I have a stable living condition and a roof over my head.”
Asshat: “A cardboard box on the street seems to be trendy way to be thrifty and obtain all you’re asking for! I sell them, give me money!”Next time he complains about something, we should give him similar advice.
Asshat: “Man, I wish I could own a yacht like the other rich guys in my golf club.”
Us: “This rowboat seems to be trendy way to be thrifty and obtain all you’re asking for! I sell them, give me money!”
Nice! Good job all. It sucks that our wealth is being harvested by a few psychos but dam we are working our asses off and generating vasts amounts of it. For someone else but still damn, super impressed.
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Eat the rich
Plenty of meat on those bones.
And the marbling!
It’s to
diekill for
So I’m not against eating (or better yet taxing) the rich, but if this article talks about the 1% global/worldwide, you’re likely in that 1%. The cutoff is like anyone with a job that makes 60k$ a year and no kids.
44 trillion would end world… problems.
Let’s END… the… problem.
🍽️ the 🤑
And here I am terrified to spend a penny.
Maybe the billionaires will buy each other’s shit and we can all just die already and let them play with resources without us.
I don’t know what I’m trying to say. Going to bed for my back to back 16 hour shifts over the next two days.
Good night fellow poors.
“I could hire half the poor to kill the other half.”
And in the end, even those jobs were automated.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2023/08/07/flying-sniper-drone-takes-aim/?sh=77de157153fd
The whole episteme of ownership we operate under would be a brilliant farce if it wasnt floating on an ocean of blood. Disrespect ownership. That doesn’t just mean taking shit (but it absolutely also means taking shit)
Capitalism is working as intended, support ticket closed.
When do we start taking heads?
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Absolutely disgusting. And conservatives are itching to cut taxes on the wealthy even further.
… But it’s the poor mother pulling herself up by the bootstraps, making the perilous journey north to work comparatively-shit jobs to help give her kids a brighter future that is apparently the problem to righties — who, by the way — we all benefit from their cheap labor in the first place…
$20 spent to a person making 100,000/year…
… Is the same as a single-billionaire spending $200,000.
OFF. WITH. THEIR. HEADS.
May be unpopular but congrats to all 7 of them
Your comment made me think. Realistically, the top 1% represents tens of millions of people, but I would very much like to know if the top 1% has gotten bigger or smaller with wealth being more and more concentrated to the top.
