The Federal Reserve's 2025 Survey of Consumer Finances shows real median family income up 7% from 2022 to $82,200, while mean income fell 6% to $145,200. Wealth moved in the opposite distributional pattern: median net worth rose only 2% to $215,900, but mean net worth increased 7% to $1.24 million. The useful reading is not a single prosperity score. The typical family's income improved even as the upper end pulled the average down; wealth gains were much more visible in the average than at the median.
Debt outstanding was broadly stable, yet the share of families spending more than 40% of income on debt payments rose from 6.5% to 8.6%, a level last seen in the 2013 survey. Stock ownership slipped from 58% to 56%; among owners, the median holding rose 36% to $77,400. These are repeated cross-sections, not a panel tracking the same households.
The 2025 SCF also adds a direct top-down measure of annual spending. That begins to close a longstanding measurement gap between spending surveys that under-sample the very wealthy and a balance-sheet survey that previously lacked a comprehensive spending total. Fed release · 2025 SCF · Spending-method note