🤑 Swedes have become three times wealthier and also more equal in the 21st century

• Median wealth rose by nearly 400 percent between 1999 and 2020.
• The richest 10 percent reduced their share of total wealth from 67 to 57 percent.
• The share of adults with no net wealth fell from 21 to 16 percent.

Median wealth grew fivefold

A new study maps how the wealth of Swedes developed between 1999 and 2020. The researchers built a new database covering the entire population. It combines tax data, property registers, ownership records for companies and shares, pension accounts, and debt records.

Wealth rose across the entire population. Average real net wealth per adult rose by roughly 200 percent. That means the average Swede was three times as wealthy in 2020 as in 1999.

Median wealth rose even more, by nearly 400 percent. The person in the middle of the distribution was thus five times as wealthy in 2020 as in 1999. Median wealth rose from around 24,000 euros in 1999 to around 120,000 euros in 2020. Relative growth was largest in the lower and middle parts of the distribution.

Economic inequality declined

The researchers measured economic inequality with the Gini coefficient. It is a measure that runs from 0 to 1. A value of 0 means everyone owns the same amount. A value of 1 means a single person owns everything. The lower the value, the more evenly wealth is distributed. In Sweden the Gini coefficient fell from 0.87 to 0.77.

The richest 10 percent of Swedes saw their share of total wealth fall from 67 to 57 percent. The richest 1 percent's share dropped from 31 to 26 percent. The poorest half of the population owned a negative share of wealth at the start of the period. By the end of the period that share had turned positive.

Occupational pensions evened things out

The researchers point to the spread of funded occupational pensions as the main reason economic inequality declined. Pensions' contribution to the Gini coefficient fell from about 0.25 in 1999 to 0.12 in 2020. For people in the lower part of the distribution, pension funds now make up the bulk of their assets.

Fewer people without assets

The share of adults with zero or negative net wealth fell from 21 to 16 percent. Those who still lack assets are largely young, and many are students or early in their working lives.

Younger generations wealthier than earlier ones

Later-born generations hold more net wealth than earlier generations did at the same age. This sets Sweden apart from the United States and the United Kingdom, where generational wealth growth has stalled. The researchers link the Swedish pattern to funded pensions and to broader participation in housing and financial markets.

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