This Chart Taught Me Some Mindblowing Lessons About Wealth
Stocks and mutual funds won’t make you rich. Starting your own business will.
So, I discovered this chart by a post from James Camp, a guy I follow on X, who specializes in “nanoflips.”
The graph comes from Visual Capitalist, a clever website that takes complex information and distills it into to easy to understand (and colorful) charts.
The chart displayed above is based on a Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances from 2016, and it contains some illuminating aspects about how people in different net worth tiers manage their wealth.
Like many, I’ve always been under the impression that stocks and mutual funds are the best ways to build and maintain wealth for the average person. Over the last few years, I’ve diligently maxed out my 401(k) and IRA funds. I contribute regularly into a personal brokerage account. Even through the Covid Crash and the 2022 drawdown, I kept plugging away, dollar-cost averaging into the market like you “should.”
The returns have been solid, for sure. While I’m not close to retirement anytime soon, I’ve built up a decent net worth. I like to think I’ve “secured the bag.” Meaning that even if I never contributied another dime to my investment accounts from now…
