The 19 Richest Households in the U.S. Gained $1T in Wealth Last Year

The richest 19 American households saw an astonishing $1 trillion wealth increase in 2024. That is the largest 12-month surge on record, according to one economist. The small group—which makes up just 0.00001 percent of the population—commands a 1.8 percent share (around $2.6 trillion) of America’s total household wealth (around $148 trillion). Their share is therefore worth more than the total value of Switzerland’s economy, according to the Wall Street Journal. In 2023, the 0.00001 percent’s share of total U.S. household wealth stood at 1.2 percent, making the jump to 1.8 percent the largest on record for a single 12-month period, said Gabriel Zucman, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Paris School of Economics. “You see this gradual rise and then, very recently, dramatic acceleration in the rise of the share of wealth owned by the truly super-wealthy,” said Zucman. Trump acolytes Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg are in the rarified group, as are other high-profile businessmen Bill Gates and Warren Buffett.