I don’t want to be too abrasive about this, but it needs to be said because I’m tired of hearing people suggest otherwise, even accidentally.
The sharp increase in the value of corporate equities held by the bottom 50% of Americans since 2020 is meaningless in the grand scheme of things.
I mention that because a couple of people on finance-focused social media this week seized on a chart from Citadel’s Scott Rubner to suggest the pandemic era meaningfully shifted the equity ownership dynamic in America.
Importantly, Scott didn’t mean to suggest anything of the sort. Or at least I hope he didn’t, because any such suggestion isn’t just demonstrably false, it’s absurd bordering on the ludicrous. (That’s social media for you: Contextless parroting on the way to ludicrous absurdity.)
In the interest of dispensing with this silliness, I present to you the chart below which uses the exact same Fed data Rubner used for his chart — i.e., for the chart showing the value of the bottom 50%’s equity wealth “increas[ing] by 542%,” as he put it.
That 542% “windfall” — the equity value gain for the least fortunate Americans — is so “large” that it isn’t easily visible to the naked eye when it’s charted in context. Note the emphasis: In context. You always, always need the context, and you will never, never find it on social media.
So please, for the sake of decency and also in the interest of preserving your own sanity, stop parroting any version of a narrative that says poor people are rich now. I can assure you they aren’t.
Yes, that cohort’s share of total corporate equity market value in America doubled versus where it stood on the eve of the pandemic. But that doubling was from 0.5% to 1%. That’s the only way regular Americans are “1%ers.”
Thank you for your sanity in an insane world. Sure, I bet some people have turned $5000 into $10,000. But the only way the market provides meaningful wealth is if you can put significant money into the account. In 2025, the poverty income level for a family of 4 is $32,150. In 2025 wealthy was considered to have a net worth of 2.3 million. Anyone who has been in the stock market knows it would be mathematically impossible for someone to take the $20-$50 a week and turn it into a couple of million.
Mark Twain, quoting Benjamin Disraeli, is often credited with describing three kinds of lies: “… white lies, damn lies, and statistics.” Yeah like the stuff that says the poor are now rich. No they are not.
Now I feel silly for having referenced that in your comments 🙂 However, the above wasn’t lost on me at all and I was more curious about whether the increase in equity ownership is just the poors realizing they’d never get ahead and deciding to YOLO their savings and/or housing down payments that are hopelessly insufficient for buying their own piece of the American dream.
I just needed a filler article for a slow day. I had this one in my pocket thanks to you. Ha.
I’m merely a cat’s paw in Heisenberg’s game. A Jesse Pinkman if you will.
A real gem -“Contextless parroting on the way to ludicrous absurdity”.
Nothing x 5 = still nothing. That’s all.