In economics and business, wealth (or net worth) of a person, household, or nation is the value of all assets owned net of all liabilities owed (to foreigners in the national accounts) at a point in time. The term may also be used more broadly as referring to the productive capacity of a society or as a contrast to poverty. Analytical emphasis may be on its determinants or distribution.

Economic terminology distinguishes between two types of variables: a stock and a flow. Wealth, as measurable at a date in time, is a stock, like the value of an orchard on December 31 minus debt owed on the orchard. For a given amount of wealth, say at the beginning of the year, income from that wealth, as measurable over say a year is a flow. What marks the income as a flow is its measurement per unit of time, like the value of apples yielded from the orchard per year.

In macroeconomic theory the 'wealth effect' may refer to the increase in aggregate consumption from an increase in national wealth. One measure of it is the wealth elasticity of demand. It is the percentage change in the amount demanded of consumption for each one-percent change in wealth.

Wealth may be measured in nominal or real values. The assets include those that are tangible (land and capital) and financial (money, bonds, etc.). Measurable wealth typically excludes intangible or nonmarketable assets such as human capital and social capital. In economics, 'wealth' corresponds to the accounting term 'net worth'. But analysis may adapt typical accounting conventions for economic purposes in social accounting (such as in national accounts). An example of the latter is generational accounting of social security systems to include the present value projected future outlays considered as liabilities. Macroeocnomic questions include whether the issuance of government bonds affects investment and consumption through the wealth effect.

Environmental assets are not usually ccounted in measuring wealth, in part due to the difficulty of valuing environmental assets. However, it has been argued that although imperfect, an educated valuation is superior to a value of zero (as the implied valuation of environmental assets).

• Inequality (10)
• Veblen, Thorstein@ (7)

See also:

• Society: Issues: Fraud: Business Opportunities (7)

• Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF)
  federalreserve.gov
  The Federal Reserve's household-level repeated cross-section survey
• SSRN listings for JEL E21: Consumption; Saving
  papers.ssrn.com
  The repository of academic papers about consumption and saving at the Social Science Research Network, filtered by Journal of Economic Literature classification code
• Wealth is a Zero-Sum Game
  kellysite.net
  The book "In Defense of Democratic Capitalism" exposits the view in this page's title.