IS MEDIAN WEALTH MUCH HIGHER IN GREECE THAN IN GERMANY?

IS MEDIAN WEALTH MUCH HIGHER IN GREECE THAN IN GERMANY?. The European Central Bank has published results of a survey on household wealth, and the results are very surprising. This Wall Street Journal article by Brian Blackstone and Nina Koeppen (April 10) reports the results of the survey that have drawn the most attention: “The median, or midpoint, of German households had just over €50,000 in wealth, the lowest in the euro zone. The median in Greece, was twice that, at €102,000….” In fact, the median figure for Germany was the lowest in the Euro zone. Suggested explanations are that Germany has a very low rate of home ownership; and that these are household figures and German households have fewer people in them than elsewhere in Europe. I would also suggest as a factor that measuring income and wealth presents difficulties that are not usually discussed in popular journalism. (The National Bureau of Economic Research has an annual series of books going back over 60 years which deal with these complications.

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