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Interesting fact of the day. USA isnt just the wealthiest country in the world. it is the wealthiest by a huge margin.
Here are the numbers:
Total household wealth by country:
United States (30.8%)
China (18.6%)
Japan (5.0%)
Germany (3.8%)
United Kingdom (3.5%)
France (3.5%)
India (3.4%)
Canada (2.5%)
That puts the USA well ahead of even China, the second largest.
For comparison USA has 50% more total household wealth than all of Europe combined.
@freemo@qoto.org Now I'm more interest in which countries have the highest and lowest wealth differences between households. You can have one household dragging everyone else up otherwise.
@FailForward @trinsec @freemo
I was about to mention the Gini Index, but you beat me to it.
@tatzelbrumm Income inequality isnt a bad thing when your poorest live well.
The poor pump in the USA is quite a bit farther ahead than the poor bump in most of the world, and thats what matters, not the dispersion.
@freemo
I can’t seem to convince Wolfram Alpha to give me not the income, but wealth distribution in the USA vs. Canada and Germany.
As for anecdotic evidence,
I’ve seen lots more homeless people in the streets in the USA (San Diego) than in Germany (Tübingen).
And while you’re solidly in the top quintile (probably even top percent) of both income and household wealth,
as potentially unemployable as I am (you can check if you want to),
I won’t drop anywhere as deep here in Germany than in the USA.
“Check your privilege” sounds disgustingly woke, but there you are.
@freemo @tatzelbrumm I tend to agree. In most western countries have a progressive tax system and the rich are heavily taxed, in the UK for example the top 5% provides 50% of the tax income. The USA is higher at 60%. While not all of this supports the poorer in society a significant proportion does. I don’t get the idea of equality except when it comes to equal opportunity to better oneself. Over taxing the rich is a disincentive to those who have the ability to earn more.
@freemo for what purpose would this metric be useful? Isn't the per capita metric much more meaningful to avoid mixing wealth from population size?