The Boston-based research firm Cerulli Associates projects that $124 trillion in family wealth will be transferred through 2048, with Gen Z becoming the first generation to reach inheritance parity between male and female heirs.
Women in Gen Z and younger (under 27 years old) are predicted to receive $8 trillion through 2048, which is the same as their U.S. male counterparts. This marks a shift from older generations, whose male heirs always inherited more than females.
Cerulli reported that millennial men (ages 27-42) will receive $24 million, compared with $22 million for women; while men in Generation X (ages 43-58) will inherit $23 million, compared with $16 million for women in the same generation.
“Our data on decedent decision-making and household formation rates and gender-based household financial discretion levels among different generations suggests that the younger the inheriting generation, the more equitably control of these inheritances will be dispersed across gender lines,” said Chayce Horton, the lead author of the Cerulli report. “Our data shows that 47% of wealth transferred to millennials will be controlled by women, while a perfect parity of 50% of the wealth transferred to Gen Z and younger households will be given to women.”
Of the total $124 trillion transferred through 2048, Cerulli expects $18 trillion will go to charity and $105 trillion to heirs, with women inheriting $47 trillion. The vast majority of the wealth — nearly $100 trillion — will be passed down from baby boomers (over 58 years old), while $40 trillion is forecast to be first passed on intergenerationally to widowed women of the baby boomer and older generations.
“Part of our model covers when one spouse passes away and projects how much will be going to their surviving spouse versus children or other recipients in that instance,” Horton said. “One top finding shows that as older generations pass away, men tend to pass away first, and also those men typically had leading discretion and control of household finances.”
The total wealth transfer projected in Cerulli’s latest U.S. High-Net-Worth and Ultra-High-Net-Worth Markets report marks a 45% increase from the firm’s 2021 report, which said $84 trillion would be transferred through 2045.