Wealth Gap

A Pew Research Center analysis shows that while median real net worth of all U.S. households declined by 40 percent from 2007 to 2013 ($135,700 to $81,400), the gap between white households and black or Hispanic households has grown.  White household wealth declined 26.3 percent.  Black household wealth declined 42.7 percent.  Hispanic household wealth declined 41.9 percent.

Update (December 15):  Tanvi Misra explains:

What’s driving the two ends of the wealth spectrum apart is that while white wealth is growing (albeit modestly), minority wealth is declining steeply. Black household net worth declined by 33.7 percent and Hispanic net worth fell by 14.3 percent between 2010 and 2013.

During the recession, black and Hispanic households took more out of savings to keep their families afloat, but they have not been to replenish that savings post-recession.

Update (December 21):  More from Pew:  the median wealth of upper income households is now 6.6 times that of middle income households.