Older Americans may be trading in hustling for retirement, but that hasn’t stopped them from getting richer.
Baby boomers now hold a record high of the United States’ wealth, Apollo chief economist Torsten Slok noted in a December blog post, citing Federal Reserve data. Compared to 1989, when those over 70 years old held 19% of the wealth in the household sector, older Americans now own 31% of the wealth.
That chunk of change is an outsize share compared to other generations. Baby boomers, who make up about 20% of the U.S. population, hold more than $85 trillion in assets, according to Fed data. By comparison, millennials, who make up about the same percentage of Americans, hold just about $18 trillion, roughly one-fifth that of baby boomers.
Older Americans’ financial success is in especially stark comparison to that of Gen Z, a generation with deep skepticism about the economic future, who feel shut out from entry-level jobs amid the rise of AI, with many sinking into credit card debt as they struggle to repay student loans. As of 2024, the young generation had only $6 trillion in wealth, despite making up the same percentage of the population as their baby boomer and millennial counterparts.
“The baby [boomer] generation has really gobbled up a huge share of household wealth, so it’s left a lot less for other age cohorts,” Edward Wolff, professor of economics at New York University, told Fortune.
How did baby boomers benefit from good economic timing?
America’s septuagenarians were raised by parents who came of age during the Great Depression and learned the hard way the lessons of frugality and the importance of saving money. But the baby boomer generation owes a great deal of their financial security to the stars aligning during their formative years.
In the 1970s when many baby boomers entered the housing market, inflation surged, making buying a home an appealing investment. As home values soared in the following decades, so, too, did the generation’s equity. The older generation has also been boosted by stock ownership, with baby boomers holding 54% of stocks worth more than $25 trillion, according to an early 2025 analysis of Fed data by the Motley Fool. Millennials owned about 8% of stocks worth $3.9 trillion.
But Gen Z, who may be following baby boomers’ lead in stock market investments, have not shared the same good fortune in the housing market. Housing supply has been low since the 2008 recession, exacerbated by sky-high mortgage rates, which disincentivized home sales and contributed to exorbitant home prices.
As a result, 2025 saw a 21% drop in the share of first-time homebuyers, and the age of those buyers reached a record high of 40 years, according to November 2025 data from the National Association of Realtors, leaving Gen Z to wait a little longer for the keys to their first homes. A March 2025 Redfin report found today, just 33% of 27-year-olds own their homes compared to 40% of baby boomers who owned their homes when they were the same age.
“They weren’t able to enjoy the big appreciation of house prices to the same extent as baby boomers,” Wolff said.
To be sure, not all baby booms have experienced soaring passive wealth in their twilight years. A growing number of older Americans have “unretired,” part of a trend of a graying workforce that has seen the number of individuals 65 and over who are working has quadrupled since the 1980s. While many of these individuals are working to continue to save money and take advantage of an employer’s health insurance, others are still clocking in simply because they work less-demanding white-collar jobs and are living longer.
What is Gen Z’s silver lining?
Gen Z may be facing generation-defining economic challenges, but there’s hope for them yet. Pew Research Center data from 2024 indicates Gen Z may actually be in better financial shape than young people in past generations: In 2023, Zoomers made a median pay of about $20,000, adjusted for inflation. In 1993, 18- to 24-year-olds made about $15,000. Income growth finally outpacing home price growth may also be a silver lining for prospective home buyers. A 2025 Bank of America report projected that by 2035, Gen Z would be the wealthiest generation with $74 trillion in wealth and is expected to grow to 30% of the population over the next decade.
But part of the equation of Gen Z’s relatively paltry share of wealth is simply because they haven’t had as much time to acquire it, Michael Walden, professor emeritus of economics at North Carolina State University, told Fortune.
“It makes logical sense that older people will accumulate greater percentages of wealth at any point in time because they’ve had more years to invest and reap the returns of their investments,” Walden said.
Beyond just more time, Gen Z will indirectly benefit from the investments made by their parents and grandparents as they await the Great Wealth Transfer that promises to distribute, by some estimations, $124 trillion in inheritance to the younger generations. Just last year, 91 heirs inherited a record $297.8 billion, according to the UBS Billionaire Ambitions Report, a 36% increase from last year.
Walden said the Great Wealth Transfer is coming, but Gen Z and millennials shouldn’t rely on the death of a loved one to begin their wealth acquisition journey in earnest.
“It’s hard to target when that’s going to come, so I would argue to any young person that I would be talking to, have a plan, be consistent with the plan,” he said.
A version of this story was published on Fortune.com on Dec. 8, 2025.
More on how different generations are building wealth:
- As baby boomers are forced to ‘unretire’ because they’ve not saved enough, 6-year-olds in Germany are being given retirement accounts
- Forget the K-shaped economy, market veteran Ed Yardeni says—instead, it’s boomers hoarding wealth while Gen Z struggles to build it
- Gen Z may not be able to afford a house or the cost of living—but give it 10 years. They’re on track to gain $36T and become the richest generation
- The $124 trillion Great Wealth Transfer is intensifying as inheritance jumps to a new record, with one 19-year-old reaping the rewards
