Whether going to college is worth it and what kinds of degrees are worth it are controversial topics right now.
One takeaway from the Census Bureau annuity and trust ownership data is clear, however: Higher education has a strong correlation with how likely Americans are to own annuities and trusts.
The bureau collects the data through its Survey of Income and Program Participation, which offers much less extensive access tools than bigger bureau survey programs.
The annuity ownership results have been hidden away in mammoth data files that are too big for ordinary personal computers and spreadsheet programs to handle. The focus of the bureau has been mainly on efforts to fight poverty, not to reveal the secrets of the affluent and wealthy, and it was not entirely clear what data the bureau really had on annuities.
Now, the bureau has published some household annuity ownership data data, lumped together with household trust ownership data.
Life insurers and other organizations with big computers and data scientists on the payroll may be able to tease much more detailed, annuity-specific data out of the files the bureau used to create its tables.
The tables available show that 4.9% of all U.S. households owned assets in annuities or trusts in 2022, with a median asset value of $100,000 and an average value of $279,700.
For a look at how education attainment of the top-earning household member affected average annuity and trust asset levels, see the gallery.
Reasons: The effect of education on the odds that people will report having annuity and trust annuity income may be partly due to those people being born to parents with more money and earning more money themselves.
People with education may also be more willing to consider relatively complicated financial services possibility.
Still another possibility is that people who have been willing to spend more time in school and put off starting their careers may be more open to putting cash in arrangements that lock assets away.
Credit: denismagilov/Adobe Stock, Thinkstock
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