A century of data shows that many factors influence the evolution of household wealth.
These include property rights and other institutional considerations, the maturity of financial markets and financial instruments and the extent to which public provision of retirement pensions and health care mitigate the need for private accumulation.
These factors are among the findings of the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report 2011.
But the most important factor in the evolution of household wealth in developed economies is household income. Statistics show that the contribution of income to household wealth tends to be higher during times of high inflation.
'If we look back to the wealth data for France, the UK and the US dating back to 1900, the wealth-income ratio in the US and UK was relatively stable for most of the past century,' says Michael O'Sullivan, head of strategy, thematics and portfolio analysis in Credit Suisse's private banking division. He says upward deviations occurred only on two occasions - the Depression and the ongoing credit crisis.
The graph shows that the average wealth-income ratio for 16 rich countries, 6.35, was nearly double the 3.25 for nine emerging markets (Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, India, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa and Ukraine).