US wealth inequality is central to the affordability debate. The Federal Reserve’s October 2026 report found uneven wealth changes across groups, but little overall change in wealth inequality between 2022 and 2025.
Separate Federal Reserve findings document people going without medical care and households lacking enough food. Those hardships give substance to concerns about financial security, but the statistics do not establish that every affected person faced a direct choice between groceries and medication.
The statement that billionaires should not exist is a political position. Assessing US wealth inequality requires separating evidence about household hardship from judgments about acceptable wealth and proposals for changing taxes or public benefits.
What the new report says about US wealth inequality
Released October 9, 2026, the Survey of Consumer Finances report compares family finances in 2022 and 2025.
Inflation-adjusted median family net worth rose 2% between surveys, while mean net worth rose 7%. The median represents the middle family in the distribution; the mean is the average.
Although the report found little overall change in wealth inequality, it identified different experiences across groups. Younger families, renters and families without a high school diploma saw median wealth decline. Higher-income and older families were among groups recording substantial gains.
An overall summary can therefore coexist with financial setbacks for particular groups.
Food and medical-care hardships are documented
The Federal Reserve’s separate 2025 household hardship findings reported that 26% of adults went without some medical care because of cost in the prior year, down from 28% in 2024.
Nine percent reported skipping prescription medicine because of cost. Separately, 8% said members of their household sometimes or often did not have enough to eat in the prior month.
The food and medicine figures measure different experiences over different periods. They should not be added together or presented as the percentage choosing food over prescriptions. The cited tables do not provide that specific combined measure.
The report also found that lower-income adults were more likely to forgo care. Among those with family income below $25,000, 38% skipped some medical care because of cost, compared with 13% among those with income of at least $100,000.
Different surveys answer different questions
The hardship figures come from the Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking. Ipsos administered it online through its probability-based KnowledgePanel from October 17 through October 28, 2025. The final analytical sample included 12,934 adults.
The Federal Reserve describes weighting procedures and limitations, including possible nonresponse and coverage differences. Its published survey description explains the method.
The wealth and hardship surveys use different samples and should not be treated as linked respondent records.
What Sanders and Khanna proposed
Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Ro Khanna announced the Make Billionaires Pay Their Fair Share Act in March 2026. The introduced Senate text, S. 3956, proposes a 5% annual tax on the net assets of qualifying individuals and trusts above its $1 billion eligibility threshold.
The proposed rate applies to the qualifying taxpayer’s net assets, rather than simply the portion above the threshold. The bill also contains proposed affordability rebates and provisions addressing health coverage, housing, childcare and other services.
The sponsors argue that taxing extreme wealth would fund assistance for working families. Hourly Times’ explanation of the billionaire wealth-tax proposal provides additional background.
The policy debate turns on design and results
The Tax Foundation’s analysis disputes the sponsors’ revenue expectations, warning that avoidance, asset valuation and administrative complexity could reduce collections. These are arguments about a proposed tax’s operation, not proof that household affordability problems are unimportant.
US wealth inequality and access to necessities remain related policy concerns, but these sources do not establish a single cause for every household’s hardship or prove that one tax would resolve it.
The introduced Senate bill was referred to the Finance Committee. Further congressional action would be required before its proposed tax and benefits could become law; the sources reviewed did not establish a scheduled vote.
