Wealth by Race: The Racial Wealth Gap in America (2026 Data)

The median white family in America holds 6.3 times more wealth than the median Black family and 4.6 times more than the median Hispanic family, according to the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances. The Black-white wealth gap is larger today — measured in absolute dollars — than at any point in recorded US economic history. The gap exists at every income level and every education level. This article presents the full data picture across net worth, homeownership, income, retirement savings, student debt, and inheritance.

Key figure: Median net worth — White: $285,000 | Asian: $536,000 | Hispanic: $61,600 | Black: $44,900. The gap is driven by compounding disparities in homeownership, retirement access, wages, and intergenerational transfers — not any single factor.

Median Net Worth by Race

Source: Federal Reserve 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), Table 2 (published October 2023), 2022 dollars. “Other/Multiracial” reflects the SCF’s “Other (non-Asian) or multiple race” category; the Fed reports Asian separately rather than combined with this row.

The median white family has 6.3× the wealth of the median Black family and 4.6× the wealth of the median Hispanic family. Mean (average) figures are much higher for all groups due to concentration at the top of the wealth distribution; median figures better represent the typical family.

Wealth Gap Over Time

The Black-white median wealth ratio has improved from 5.6% in 1989 to 15.8% in 2022 — but in absolute dollar terms, the gap has widened significantly as rising asset prices benefited wealth-holders disproportionately.

All values in 2022 dollars. Source: Federal Reserve, Survey of Consumer Finances historical tables, Table 4 (1989–2022 surveys).

The housing crash and slow recovery hit minority families hardest: between 2007 and 2013 the median Black family’s wealth fell 44% and the median Hispanic family’s 42%, against 26% for white families. Black and Hispanic families held more of their wealth in home equity, which collapsed, while wealthier white families held more diversified portfolios.

Homes, Retirement Accounts and Businesses

Home equity is the largest single component of wealth for most middle-class families, and retirement accounts and businesses matter more the further up the distribution you go. The gaps in who owns these assets explain much of the wealth gap:

Source: Federal Reserve, 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances, public data (2022 dollars), our calculation. Race or ethnicity of the survey respondent. Median balances are for families that have the asset.

In 2022, 73.1% of White families owned their home, against 46.3% of Black and 51.1% of Hispanic families. Black and Hispanic homeowners also tend to hold less equity, reflecting lower home values and later purchases. The retirement-account gap is as large: about six in ten White families have a 401(k), IRA or similar account, against about a third of Black families and fewer than three in ten Hispanic families.

The Legacy of Redlining

Redlining, the practice of rating minority neighborhoods as hazardous for lending that federal housing agencies adopted in the 1930s, cut many Black families off from mortgages for decades. The Fair Housing Act banned the practice in 1968, but research using the University of Richmond’s Mapping Inequality maps finds that formerly redlined neighborhoods still tend to have lower home values and higher poverty today.

Income Gap by Race

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Income in the United States: 2024 (P60-286), Table A-1. Race alone.

Income differences explain only part of the wealth gap. At every income level, White families hold more wealth than Black or Hispanic families with similar incomes (see below).

Student Debt Gap

Black families are the most likely to carry student debt: about 35.9% of Black families had student loans in 2022, against 19.8% of White and 15.3% of Hispanic families. Black students borrow more on average and, with less family wealth to draw on, tend to repay more slowly, so the debt weighs on their net worth for longer after graduation.

Inheritance and Intergenerational Transfers

Inheritance is one of the largest single contributors to the racial wealth gap: the wealth you start adult life with is heavily shaped by your parents’ and grandparents’ wealth.

Source: Federal Reserve, “Disparities in Wealth by Race and Ethnicity in the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances,” FEDS Notes, September 2020 (2019 dollars).

White families are about three times as likely as Black families, and four times as likely as Hispanic families, to have received an inheritance, and far more expect one in future.

Business Ownership Gap

Owning a business is one of the main routes to large fortunes. In 2022, 14% of White families owned all or part of a business, against 8.9% of Black and 9.1% of Hispanic families, and the typical business owned by a White family was worth several times more. Access to startup capital, often from family wealth or home equity, is a documented barrier for minority-owned firms.

Wealth Gap at Every Income Level

The racial wealth gap is not a product of income differences alone. At the same income level, Black and Hispanic families hold substantially less wealth than White families, reflecting differences in homeownership, inheritance and retirement savings:

Source: Federal Reserve, 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances, public data (2022 dollars), our calculation. Income groups are percentiles of all families’ income. Fewer than 100 Black and Hispanic families were surveyed in each of the top two groups, so those figures are approximate.

The gap is widest in relative terms at the bottom of the income distribution and narrows, but does not close, at higher incomes. A Black family in the 60th–80th income percentile has a median net worth about the same as a White family one income group lower.

Related Data

• Average Income by Race — detailed wage and household income breakdown
• Wealth Inequality in America — the wealth gap by income percentile
• Generational Wealth Gap — how wealth differs by generation
• Economic Mobility by State — which states offer the best upward mobility
• Cost of Being Poor — the financial penalties for low-income households
• Homeownership Rate by State — state-level data on who owns homes

Part of our net worth guide.

Written by WealthVieu

WealthVieu researches and writes data-driven personal finance guides using primary sources including the IRS, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Federal Reserve, and Census Bureau.