How Much Money Every American Would Have If Wealth Were Evenly Distributed In The US, According To Research
Life would look very different for almost everyone if we all shared the wealth.
Miljan Zivkovic | Shutterstock Everyone knows that wealth is unevenly distributed in the United States and the world in general, really. A very small percentage of people hold the majority of the money in the country, while the rest of us are left to stumble along with whatever we can string together.
Obviously, the U.S. doesn’t work under an economic system in which wealth is distributed evenly. But if it did, how would that change people’s lives? Think of it like tip pooling. If wealth in the U.S. were distributed evenly to each person, how much would we each be entitled to?
Here’s how much money every American would have if wealth were distributed evenly in the U.S.
Many people have undoubtedly wondered what would happen if they could get their hands on just a little bit of the wealth of the top 1%. Go Banking Rates decided to calculate exactly what would happen if wealth were distributed evenly in the U.S., and the results were pretty shocking.
Writing for the outlet, Andrew Lisa explained that Americans hold a combined $160.35 trillion in wealth. To the average person, that sounds like quite the payday, but someone in the top 1% probably wouldn’t see it that way. According to Lisa, “The bottom 50% of the country shares less than 3% of that enormous pie, while the most fortunate 10% gorge on nearly all of it.”
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There are approximately 340.11 million people in the U.S. If they all shared that $160.35 trillion, each person would come away with $471,465. Not only is that more than the average person could even imagine, but it only compounds when you consider how it would add up for families. For example, a couple would hold a combined $942,930, and a family of four would have $1.89 million. Because, of course, in an ideal world, wealth would be distributed evenly regardless of age.
With the way wealth is so unevenly distributed now, it’s unbelievable how much money such a small number of people hold.
As Lisa pointed out, it’s pretty shocking to really consider how many people hold most of the wealth in the U.S. He said that the top 1% of Americans hold 30.8% of the country’s wealth at $49.46 trillion. Overall, the top 10% share two-thirds of the wealth in the U.S.
The last 30.3% of the wealth in the United States, which comes out to about $48.54 trillion, is split among the remaining 170 million people. If they split it evenly, they would each have about $23,588.
Of course, this money is not split evenly, which is why many people are living in poverty, and why many who seem to be making a relatively good living are still struggling to stay afloat.
Technically, this would put people above the poverty line, but it’s hardly enough to live off of.
According to the Department of Health and Human Services, the poverty guideline for a single person stands at $15,650. For a couple, it’s $21,150, and for a family of four, it’s $32,150. This means, of course, that if the bottom 90% of the population did evenly split the $48.54 trillion left over from the elite, they would be above the poverty line. However, that doesn’t mean it qualifies as enough money that is really needed to live.
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The World Population Review noted that most families in the U.S. spend an average of $61,334 on expenses every year. This is far above the poverty line, demonstrating that the poverty line really doesn’t mean much. And, if the remaining 90% of Americans split $48.54 trillion, it would take at least three people in a family to meet this cost of living.
The bottom line is that something is not working in the U.S. economy. The answer might not be to equally divvy up wealth to each individual, but leaving it in the hands of such a small number of people is clearly not effective either.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
