Wealth Inequality Statistics 2026
By Axis Intelligence Research
Co-author: Sarah Davis | Last updated: October 2, 2026 | License: CC BY 4.0
The top 1% of US households held 32.5% of national net worth at the end of June 2026 — a record share in the Federal Reserve’s quarterly series — while the bottom 50% held 2.3%. Axis Intelligence Research calculates that, over the past twelve months, the average top-1% household gained $1,557 in net worth for every $1 gained by the average bottom-half household.
Quick Answer
- United States: the top 1% held 32.5% of household net worth in Q2 2026, up from 31.1% a year earlier; the bottom 50% held 2.3% (Federal Reserve, Distributional Financial Accounts, released September 18, 2026).
- World: the richest 10% own about three-quarters of global wealth; the bottom half owns about 2% (World Inequality Report 2026).
- Axis Intelligence Research’s Wealth Gain Capture Ratio (WGCR) reads 1,557 for the year to Q2 2026 — the per-household dollar gain at the top versus the bottom half.
Key Findings
- According to Axis Intelligence Research, the average top-1% US household gained $1,557 in net worth for every $1 gained by the average bottom-50% household between Q2 2025 and Q2 2026, based on Federal Reserve DFA data.
- Axis Intelligence Research finds the US top 1% added $8.75 trillion in net worth in the twelve months to June 30, 2026, against $0.28 trillion for the entire bottom half of households.
- The Federal Reserve’s Distributional Financial Accounts show the US top 1% wealth share reached 32.5% in Q2 2026, while the 50th–90th percentile “middle class” share fell to 28.8% from 30.1% a year earlier.
- According to Axis Intelligence Research’s Top-Bottom Wealth Multiple (TBWM), the US top 1% holds 14.1 times the wealth share of the bottom 50% (Q2 2026), up from 13.0 times in Q2 2025.
- Axis Intelligence Research’s regional TBWM ranking, built on World Inequality Report 2026 data, places the Middle East & North Africa (37×), Sub-Saharan Africa (36×) and North America & Oceania (34×) as the world’s most top-heavy wealth distributions; Europe sits at 8.3×.
How Much Wealth Does the Top 1% Own in the US?
The top 1% of US households owned 32.5% of all household net worth at the end of Q2 2026, according to the Federal Reserve’s Distributional Financial Accounts (DFA). In dollars, that is $60.31 trillion (FRED series WFRBLT01026).
The top 0.1% alone held 15.0% (WFRBSTP1300) — so roughly 46% of the top-1% slice belongs to the thinnest tenth of it.
US Wealth Distribution by Percentile, Q2 2026
| Wealth group | Share of US net worth, Q2 2026 | Share, Q2 2025 | Change (pts) | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 0.1% | 15.0% | 14.1% | +0.9 | Fed DFA (FRED WFRBSTP1300) |
| Top 1% | 32.5% | 31.1% | +1.4 | Fed DFA (FRED WFRBST01134) |
| 90th–99th percentile | 36.4% | 36.4% | 0.0 | Fed DFA (FRED WFRBSN09161) |
| Top 10% (Axis sum) | 68.9% | 67.5% | +1.4 | Axis Intelligence Research, from Fed DFA |
| 50th–90th percentile | 28.8% | 30.1% | −1.3 | Fed DFA (FRED WFRBSN40188) |
| Bottom 50% | 2.3% | 2.4% | −0.1 | Fed DFA (FRED WFRBSB50215) |
Top-10% share is the sum of the published top-1% and 90th–99th shares. Shares are rounded to one decimal by the Fed; sums may differ by 0.1.
Top 1% Wealth Share by Quarter
| Quarter-end | Top 1% share | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Q2 2016 | 30.6% | Fed DFA |
| Q2 2020 | 29.6% | Fed DFA |
| Q1 2025 | 30.8% | Fed DFA |
| Q2 2025 | 31.1% | Fed DFA |
| Q3 2025 | 31.5% | Fed DFA |
| Q4 2025 | 31.8% | Fed DFA |
| Q1 2026 | 31.7% | Fed DFA |
| Q2 2026 | 32.5% | Fed DFA |
Source: FRED WFRBST01134, Federal Reserve DFA release of September 18, 2026.
Sarah Davis: Watch where the 1.4 points came from. The 90th–99th band didn’t move; the bottom half barely moved. The share was handed over almost entirely by the 50th–90th percentile — the households whose wealth is mostly a house with a mortgage on it. When equities rally and home prices stall, the house-rich lose share to the portfolio-rich without anyone losing a dollar. That’s the mechanism, and it’s a fee you don’t see on any statement.
A note on revisions: the Fed revises prior quarters with each release. The Q1 2026 top-1% level now stands at $54.83 trillion and a 31.7% share in the September 18, 2026 vintage. Figures on other Axis pages built from the June 2026 vintage will be swept to this release.
Who Captured the Wealth Gains? The Wealth Gain Capture Ratio (WGCR)
The Wealth Gain Capture Ratio (WGCR) is an Axis Intelligence Research metric that measures how many dollars of net-worth gain the average top-1% household received for each dollar gained by the average bottom-50% household over the same period. It answers a question share data can’t: not who has the wealth, but who got the growth.
Formula (shown in full):
WGCR = (ΔNet worth of top 1% ÷ 1) ÷ (ΔNet worth of bottom 50% ÷ 50)
Because the DFA groups are fixed percentiles of households, dividing each group’s dollar change by its population weight (1 and 50) gives the per-household comparison without needing a household count.
Inputs and calculation (12 months to Q2 2026):
| Input | Q2 2025 | Q2 2026 | Change | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 1% net worth | $51,567,387M | $60,313,023M | +$8,745,636M | FRED WFRBLT01026 |
| Bottom 50% net worth | $3,997,218M | $4,278,038M | +$280,820M | FRED WFRBLB50107 |
8,745,636 ÷ 280,820 = 31.14 → × 50 = WGCR 1,557
WGCR Readings
| Period | WGCR | Top 1% gain | Bottom 50% gain | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12 months to Q2 2026 | 1,557 | +$8.75T | +$0.28T | Axis Intelligence Research, from Fed DFA |
| Q1 → Q2 2026 (one quarter) | 2,194 | +$5.48T | +$0.12T | Axis Intelligence Research, from Fed DFA |
The baseline reading is 1,557. The single-quarter reading of 2,194 shows the second quarter of 2026 was more lopsided than the year as a whole.
In growth terms, Axis Intelligence Research finds top-1% net worth rose 17.0% over the year while bottom-50% net worth rose 7.0%. The bottom half did get richer — WGCR doesn’t say otherwise. It says the gap in dollars widened at a speed percentage growth hides.
Sarah Davis: A 7% gain on a thin base and a 17% gain on a $51 trillion base are not two flavors of “growth.” One is a rounding error on the national balance sheet; the other is the national balance sheet. The bottom half added about $281 billion in a year. The top 1% added that much roughly thirty-one times over.
Average Wealth per Household: Top 1% vs Bottom 50%
Axis Intelligence Research calculates that the average top-1% household held 705 times the net worth of the average bottom-50% household in Q2 2026, up from 645 times in Q2 2025. Formula: (top-1% level ÷ 1) ÷ (bottom-50% level ÷ 50), using the same FRED level series above.
What Is the Top-Bottom Wealth Multiple (TBWM)?
The Top-Bottom Wealth Multiple (TBWM) is an Axis Intelligence Research ratio: the wealth share of the top 1% divided by the wealth share of the bottom 50%. A TBWM of 10 means the richest hundredth of the population owns ten times what the poorer half owns combined. It’s deliberately simple so it can be recomputed by anyone from published shares.
US TBWM
| Quarter | Top 1% share | Bottom 50% share | TBWM | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q2 2025 | 31.1% | 2.4% | 13.0 | Axis Intelligence Research, from Fed DFA |
| Q2 2026 | 32.5% | 2.3% | 14.1 | Axis Intelligence Research, from Fed DFA |
Which Regions Have the Highest Wealth Inequality?
Applying the TBWM to the World Inequality Report 2026 regional wealth data (2025 shares), Axis Intelligence Research produces a ranking of the world’s most top-heavy wealth distributions.
Regional Wealth Inequality Ranking by TBWM, 2025
| Rank | Region | Top 1% share | Bottom 50% share | Top 10% share | TBWM | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Middle East & North Africa | 37% | 1% | 73% | 37.0 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
| 2 | Sub-Saharan Africa | 36% | 1% | 70% | 36.0 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
| 3 | North America & Oceania | 34% | 1% | 65–70% | 34.0 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
| 4 | Russia & Central Asia | 46% | 3% | 74% | 15.3 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
| 5 | Latin America | 36% | 3% | 65–70% | 12.0 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
| 6 | Europe | 25% | 3% | ~60% | 8.3 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
| 7 | South & Southeast Asia | 35% | 5% | 65–70% | 7.0 | WIR 2026; TBWM by Axis |
The WIR 2026 regional page reports top-10% shares for some regions as a 65–70% band; those are shown as published. East Asia is excluded because the page does not report its top-1% share.
Two readings stand out. Russia & Central Asia has the highest top-1% share anywhere (46%) yet ranks fourth, because its bottom half holds 3% rather than 1%. And Sub-Saharan Africa — rarely in the wealth-inequality headlines — sits within one point of the most unequal region on Earth.
Sarah Davis: Why won’t we put the US Fed figure (14.1) in the same table as North America & Oceania (34)? Because they’re different instruments. The DFA scales Survey of Consumer Finances microdata to the Fed’s national balance sheet; WID uses its own distributional national accounts and a broader region. Merging them would produce a number that looks precise and measures nothing. Read each against its own series.
How Unequal Is Global Wealth in 2026?
The World Inequality Report 2026 executive summary reports that the top 10% own about three-quarters of global wealth while the bottom half holds about 2%. The wealthiest 0.001% — fewer than 60,000 people — have seen their share rise from almost 4% in 1995 to over 6%. Billionaire and centi-millionaire wealth has grown at roughly 8% a year since the 1990s, about twice the pace of the bottom half. On income, the bottom half of the world captures less than 10% of global income.
Global Wealth Concentration at a Glance
| Indicator | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Top 10% share of global wealth | ~75% | 2025 | WIR 2026 |
| Bottom 50% share of global wealth | ~2% | 2025 | WIR 2026 |
| Top 0.001% share of global wealth | over 6% (from almost 4% in 1995) | 2025 | WIR 2026 |
| Global personal wealth growth | 10.8% | 2025 | UBS Global Wealth Report 2026 |
| New USD millionaires per day | more than 2,600 | 2025 | UBS Global Wealth Report 2026 |
| Billionaires worldwide | 3,428, worth $20.1T | 2026 list | Forbes |
How Fast Is the Billionaire Class Growing?
Forbes’ 2026 World’s Billionaires list counts 3,428 billionaires with combined wealth of $20.1 trillion — 400 more people and $4 trillion more than a year earlier. The United States leads with 989 billionaires; China (including Hong Kong) follows with 610.
Is the Global Middle Getting Richer?
Partly. UBS reports that the share of adults in the lowest wealth band (under $10,000) dropped from almost 75% in 2000 to just over 41% in 2025, and that global wealth rose 10.8% in 2025 (from 4.6% in 2024). The US alone added more than 440,000 new millionaires. Both things are true at once: the floor has risen over 25 years, and the top keeps pulling away faster in dollar terms.
Sarah Davis: “Nearly a million new millionaires” is the stat that travels. Read it next to the US average UBS reports — $696,277 per adult — and remember what an average does in a distribution where the top 1% owns 32.5%: it gets dragged toward the top. Nobody should read that figure as what a typical household holds.
Does Wealth Inequality Show Up in Carbon Emissions?
Yes, according to the World Inequality Report 2026: the top 10% account for 77% of emissions associated with private capital ownership, the top 1% for 41%, and the bottom 50% for just 3%. This is the capital-ownership lens — emissions attributed to the assets people own, not the fuel they burn.
Methodology
Collection. Axis Intelligence Research fetched every figure on this page from its primary publisher on October 1, 2026: the Federal Reserve Board’s Distributional Financial Accounts (via the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis FRED series cited inline, September 18, 2026 release), the World Inequality Lab’s World Inequality Report 2026, UBS’s Global Wealth Report 2026 press release (June 30, 2026), and Forbes’ 2026 World’s Billionaires facts (March 10, 2026). Every number appears as a row in the downloadable dataset with its URL and retrieval date.
Axis calculations.
- WGCR = (ΔTop-1% net worth ÷ 1) ÷ (ΔBottom-50% net worth ÷ 50), using DFA dollar levels.
- TBWM = Top-1% share ÷ Bottom-50% share, applied separately to DFA (US) and WIR (regions).
- Average household multiple = (Top-1% level ÷ 1) ÷ (Bottom-50% level ÷ 50).
- Top-10% share = Top-1% share + 90th–99th share.
- Growth rates = (Q2 2026 level ÷ Q2 2025 level − 1) × 100.
What to keep in mind. The DFA bottom-50% share is rounded to one decimal, so the TBWM moves in visible steps when that share ticks by 0.1 point; WGCR uses unrounded dollar levels and is the more sensitive of the two. Fed and WID figures come from different methods and are never merged.
About This Dataset
File: wealth-inequality-statistics.csv — 98 rows, tidy long format, with source organization, document, URL, retrieval date, primary-source flag and Axis-calculation notes on every row. Also published on Hugging Face, Kaggle and GitHub under the same name.
License: CC BY 4.0. Reuse freely with attribution: “Axis Intelligence Research, Wealth Inequality Statistics 2026.”
How to Cite This Page
APA: Axis Intelligence Research, & Davis, S. (2026, October 2). Wealth inequality statistics 2026: The top 1% gained $1,557 for every $1 the bottom half gained. Axis Intelligence. https://axis-intelligence.com/wealth-inequality-statistics/
MLA: Axis Intelligence Research, and Sarah Davis. “Wealth Inequality Statistics 2026: The Top 1% Gained $1,557 for Every $1 the Bottom Half Gained.” Axis Intelligence, 2 Oct. 2026, axis-intelligence.com/wealth-inequality-statistics/.
Chicago: Axis Intelligence Research, and Sarah Davis. “Wealth Inequality Statistics 2026: The Top 1% Gained $1,557 for Every $1 the Bottom Half Gained.” Axis Intelligence, October 2, 2026. https://axis-intelligence.com/wealth-inequality-statistics/.
Wealth Gap Questions, Answered With the Data
Is the US wealth gap at a record high in 2026?
On the Federal Reserve’s DFA measure, yes for the top-1% share: 32.5% in Q2 2026 is the highest reading in the quarterly series, up from 31.1% a year earlier.
How much net worth did the top 1% gain in the past year?
$8.75 trillion between June 30, 2025 and June 30, 2026, per Axis Intelligence Research’s calculation from Fed DFA levels — rising from $51.57 trillion to $60.31 trillion.
Why did the middle class lose wealth share if home values didn’t crash?
Share is relative. The 50th–90th percentile holds wealth mostly in housing; the top 1% mostly in equities and private businesses. When financial assets outpace housing, the middle’s share falls (30.1% to 28.8%) even as its dollars hold steady.
What does a WGCR of 1,557 mean in plain terms?
For every $1 of net worth the average bottom-half US household gained over the year to Q2 2026, the average top-1% household gained $1,557.
Which part of the world has the most unequal wealth distribution?
By Axis Intelligence Research’s TBWM on WIR 2026 data, the Middle East & North Africa (37×), narrowly ahead of Sub-Saharan Africa (36×) and North America & Oceania (34×).
Do billionaires really own a growing slice of world wealth?
Yes. WIR 2026 shows the top 0.001% share rising from almost 4% (1995) to over 6%, and Forbes counts 3,428 billionaires worth $20.1 trillion in 2026, up $4 trillion in a year.
Can the bottom 50% get richer while inequality rises?
Yes, and it happened this year: bottom-50% US net worth grew 7.0%, but top-1% net worth grew 17.0% on a base about thirteen times larger, so the dollar gap widened.
Why do different sources give different top-1% shares for the US?
They measure differently. The Fed’s DFA reconciles survey data with national balance sheets each quarter; WID’s distributional accounts cover North America & Oceania together and update annually. Compare figures within a series, not across them.
Related Axis research: US High-Net-Worth Statistics 2026 · US Wealth Management Statistics 2026 · Robo-Advisor Statistics 2026 · Vanguard Statistics 2026 · Startup Statistics 2026