WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump rolled out an eye-catching statistic in his State of the Union address Tuesday: the wealth held by the poorest half of American households increased three times as fast as the wealth held by the "1%" since he became president.
That’s true, according to Federal Reserve data.
On average, Americans have seen a 17% jump in household wealth since Trump’s election, while wealth at the bottom half has increased 54%.
"This is a blue collar boom," Trump also said Tuesday. That’s less apparent. The biggest winners on a dollar basis were a familiar group - whites, college graduates, and people born during the "baby boom" between 1946 and 1964.
Since December 2016, President Barack Obama’s last full month in office, aggregate household wealth has increased by $15.8 trillion, but the vast majority went to groups that have tended to accumulate wealth in the past.
Even with a 54% increase in their household wealth under Trump, the poorest half of American households, around 64 million families, still have just 1.6% of household "net worth." |