The financial position of American households has changed significantly since 1970. To
understand these changes better and to assess their implications, the Board of Governors of
the Federal Reserve System, the United States Department of Health and Human Services,
and five other federal agencies joined together to sponsor the 1983 Survey of Consumer
Finances. 1 The overriding common interest among the sponsors was the estimation of the
debt obligations and asset holdings of a nationally representative sample of American …

EACH year the Survey Research Center publishes a monograph entitled Survey of
Consumer Finances in order to make its findings on consumer behavior available as
promptly as possible. Information on the distribution of major consumer outlays and the
factors responsible for their changes is published to make it possible for scholars, policy
makers in government and business, and all those interested in economic trends to analyze
and use the data on important and often greatly fluctuating elements of Gross National …

Using data that have just become available from the 1995 Survey of Consumer Finances
(SCF) along with data from the 1989 and 1992 versions of the survey, this article details
recent changes in the income, net worth, assets, and liabilities of US families. It also
presents information on family saving, unrealized capital gains, debt payments, and
institutional providers of credit. Its primary focus is on changes in family finances between
the 1992 and 1995 surveys; however, selected 1989 survey data provide a broader context …

BACKGROUND In 1998, the US economy entered the seventh year of an economic
expansion. The civilian unemployment rate had fallen from 5.7 percent in September 1995
to 4.5 percent in September 1998. At the same time, inflation remained subdued, with the
consumer price index rising at an average annual rate of 2.2 percent over the period.