U.S. households added almost $119 trillion in net worth in this year’s second quarter, a 6.8-percent gain over the first quarter.
About $5.7 trillion of the added wealth came from stock market gains (of which 10 percent of the population owns 87 percent and 1 percent owns 52 percent); appreciation in real estate added $500 million.
During the same time, non-mortgage consumer debt fell at 6.6 percent, the sharpest plunge since World War II.
Credit card balances stood at $1.02 trillion before COVID struck and have since dropped to about $953.8 billion. Auto loans increased slightly during the period.
Against this good news for consumers, government and corporate debt zoomed to $59.3 trillion, with government debt alone rising to $58.9 trillion as Congress passed the CARES Act and the U.S. Federal Reserve rolled out an array of loans and grants to rescue the economy.
State government debt rose 3.5 percent, the greatest amount since 2009, and debt owed by businesses outside the financial sector expanded by 14 percent, the most since at least 1980.
