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ECIN Replication Package for "What Role for 'Generational Wealth' in Explaining Racial Wealth Disparities"

Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s) Jeffrey Thompson, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston; John Sabelhaus, Brookings Institute

Version: View help for Version V1

Name	File Type	Size	Last Modified
1.2-Raw-Data-_-SCF-Bulletin			04/17/2025 07:40:AM
A1. ReadME for Sabelhaus Thompson EI.pdf	application/pdf	242.8 KB	04/17/2025 05:07:AM
Career track synthetic panel base file - asset composition.dta	application/x-stata-dta	1.5 GB	04/16/2025 07:34:PM
CareerTrack.do	text/plain	99 KB	04/16/2025 07:36:PM
DB_household092820.dta	application/x-stata-dta	36.8 MB	04/16/2025 07:38:PM
Figure 1. Interest in Generational Wealth over Time.xlsx	application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet	47.8 KB	04/16/2025 07:49:PM
Figure 2. Racial Gaps in Mean Private and Market Wealth over Time, All Ages - formatted.xlsx	application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet	37.3 KB	04/16/2025 12:07:PM
Figure 2. Racial Gaps in Mean Private and Market Wealth over Time, All Ages, 1989–2019, real 2019$.do	text/plain	1.8 KB	04/16/2025 07:46:PM
Figure 3. Composition of Assets by Race - formatted.xlsx	application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet	23.9 KB	03/28/2025 07:38:AM
Figure 3. Composition of Assets by Race.do	text/plain	1.7 KB	03/31/2025 05:54:AM

Project Citation:

Thompson, Jeffrey, and Sabelhaus, John. ECIN Replication Package for “What Role for ‘Generational Wealth’ in Explaining Racial Wealth Disparities.” Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2025-04-17. https://doi.org/10.3886/E226964V1

Project Description

Summary: The study explores the role of "intergenerational wealth" - or inheritances and inter vivos transfers - in explaining racial disparities in wealth for the United States using data from the Federal Reserve Board's triennial Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), supplemented by additional data including estimates for Defined Benefit pension values, lifetime earnings, and "reconciled inheritance" values that are designed to be used with the SCF. The core SCF data and the supplemental files are for the 1989 to 2019 cross-sections of the survey.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms: wealth; inequality; racial disparities; inheritance

JEL Classification:
      D14 Household Saving; Personal Finance
      D31 Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions
      D63 Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
      J15 Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
      J32 Nonwage Labor Costs and Benefits; Retirement Plans; Private Pensions

Manuscript Number: ECIN-Jan-2025-0035

Geographic Coverage: United States

Time Period(s): 1989 – 2019

Universe: United States non-institutionalized "primary economic units," a distinct concept used in the SCF that is based on a survey of households, but in practice more similar to "family" than "household."

Data Type(s): survey data

Collection Notes: The original FRB SCF data are supplemented by several additional data (DB pension values, lifetime earnings, and "reconciled inheritances") sources which are themselves originally developed using the SCF.

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Published Versions

V3 [2025-07-29]

V2 [2025-06-28]

V1 [2025-04-17]

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