Statistics in Support of TFAC
The State of the Union
More than half of all stocks are owned by only 1 percent of Americans, while the bottom half of the population owns only 0.7 percent of the market.
The three richest Americans control more wealth than half of the country. Only half of American families own stock. And of those that do, the top 10% own the vast majority.
-Federal Reserve Bank of Saint Louis, Economic Research
Retirement Savings in America
Experts Agree: Action is Needed
“Speaking of 2034, that’s precisely the year when the old-age portion of the Social Security Trust Fund is expected to run dry. After that, taxes will cover only 76% of benefits. There are sensible ways for Congress to fix that now. My guess is it will ignore these, then turn to a yearly process of midnight-hour wailing and preening to plug shortfalls, acting only because old people vote. But it’s just a guess, and even my soothsayer tells me that one’s too crazy to call.”
— Jack Hough, A Math Problem for the Ages: When to Claim Social Security
Barron’s, September 7, 2020, p. 9.
“Globally, the share of income going to the highest earners has risen sharply since the 1970s. While the average American’s real income rose by 89% from 1977 to 2018, the real median income earned by American men ages 25-54 —a reasonable proxy for the typical worker’s pay— grew by less than 2% over the same period. The corollary to the massive gap between the average and median is the fact that the share of U.S. national income earned by people in the top 1% of the distribution has roughly doubled.”
— Matthew C. Klein, Prosperity Requires a Narrower Income Gap
Barron’s, August 31, 2020, p. 31.
“Before the pandemic, the top 1% held more wealth than the bottom 90%. The stock market’s gains has accrued gains to this group while the recession ravages the employment and wages of lower-income households.”
— Karen Petrou, The Fed Doesn’t Need a New Mandate to Address Racial Injustice
Barron’s, August 24, 2020, p. 34.
“Sustainable funds, which take into account the environment, social, and governance, or ESG, impact of companies, also saw a significant pickup in 2020. The pandemic, widening economic inequality, and incessant natural disasters have all made investors more aware of the risks of corporate indifference to ESG issues. More important, sustainable funds have shown that ESG values and investment returns don’t move in opposite ways. According to Morningstar data, about 65% of domestic large-cap stock ESG funds beat the S&P 500 index in 2020, including all ten of the largest ones.
In 2020, ESG funds are expected to more than double the $21.4 billion in inflows received the priority year. Index-tracking ESG funds have grown particularly quickly; many look more like broad-market index funds than their active counterparts, making them an easier transition for investors. The largest ESG ETF, the iShares ESG Aware MSCI USA (ESGU), saw assets increase eightfold last year, to more than $13 billion from $1.5 billion at the end of 2019…”