The United States once again led global wealth creation in 2024, producing more than 1,000 new millionaires every day. This achievement not only widened its lead over every other country but also reinforced its enduring status as the world’s top destination for personal financial advancement.
According to the Global Wealth Report 2024 by UBS, the U.S. added 379,000 new millionaires last year alone. That figure dwarfs the 141,000 millionaires added by China, the world’s second-largest economy, and amounts to more than half of the 684,000 total new millionaires created globally in 2024.
This dramatic wealth expansion comes as global financial markets rebounded strongly last year, with the S&P 500 rising over 23% and the Nasdaq surging nearly 29%. UBS credited the U.S. boom to a mix of strong equity market performance and a stable U.S. dollar, which together delivered significant gains for both institutional investors and private individuals with exposure to capital markets.
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America’s Millionaire Class Swells to Record High
The United States now boasts 23.8 million millionaires—more than Western Europe and China combined. That number gives the U.S. nearly 35% of the world’s total personal wealth, further solidifying its dominance in global finance.
China, by comparison, has 6.3 million millionaires and controls just under 20% of global wealth. Other wealthy nations like Japan, Germany, France, the U.K., and Canada each count just over 2 million millionaires, a far cry from the numbers seen in the U.S.
“Over the next five years, we expect North America and Greater China to be the main drivers of global wealth growth,” the report reads.
“Land of Dreams” Still Rings True
The widening gap between the U.S. and the rest of the world—especially China—underscores America’s continued reputation as the “land of opportunity.” While China’s economy has grown rapidly over the past two decades, the U.S. continues to offer a unique combination of capital accessibility, mature financial markets, legal protections for private enterprise, and innovation-driven ecosystems that make upward financial mobility not just possible but attainable.
Entrepreneurship, stock ownership, real estate investing, and participation in retirement markets like 401(k) plans continue to give millions of Americans direct access to wealth-building tools that are either limited or tightly controlled in other economies. In countries like China, restrictions on foreign investment, heavy regulatory burdens, and growing capital flight concerns have made personal wealth growth more difficult—even for the affluent.
Millionaire Creation to Accelerate Further
Looking ahead, UBS forecasts that the global number of millionaires will rise by another 5.34 million over the next five years—a 9% increase—with North America and Greater China driving most of that growth.
Meanwhile, a separate report by Henley & Partners and New World Wealth revealed that the U.S. has seen a 78% increase in so-called liquid millionaires—those with easily accessible financial assets of at least $1 million—over the past decade. That growth rate, unmatched by any other major economy, highlights the long-term resilience of American wealth accumulation.
The U.S. dominance in wealth creation has not gone unnoticed by economists. While wealth inequality remains a challenge, the American economic model still enables vast numbers of people to climb the financial ladder at rates unseen elsewhere. From tech entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley to real estate investors in Texas and retirees with strong equity portfolios, the paths to wealth in America remain broad and accessible.
As other countries face structural challenges—from demographic shifts to state intervention in capital markets—the U.S. continues to benefit from a combination of private sector freedom, financial transparency, and global investor confidence.
While millionaire status remains out of reach for most, nowhere else on earth produces more self-made millionaires, or does so as quickly, as the United States. As the global wealth landscape evolves, the American Dream—long questioned by skeptics—appears not only intact but thriving.