全球智库信息集成服务系统

Can the poor accumulate assets? Longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and programs targeted at helping families accumulate assets provide empirical evidence that they can. Following families over a 13-year period reveals that, even among those poor more than half the time, over 40 percent increased their net worth. And following low-income, asset-poor families over time revealed that 12 years later 44 percent saved enough to escape asset poverty. This shows that across the life course a substantial proportion of poor and low-income families do manage to accumulate assets.