Affluent Market

An American goal, at least as portrayed in advertising and mass media, is to strive for affluence. But what is “affluence?” There is no one official definition. One gauge views affluence in tiers.

Mass affluent adults are defined as one-person households with an income of $75,000-$99,999 and all adults in households with a household income of $100,000-$149,999. Highly affluent adults are those living in households with a household income of $150,000-$249,999.

Super-affluent consumers are adults in households with a household income of $250,000 or more.

There are 62 million American consumers living in affluent households. Affluent consumers account for 28% of all U.S. adults. The 34 million mass affluent consumers represent 15% of all American consumers, while the highly affluent account for 9% and the super-affluent segment amounts to 4% of American adults.

Given the projected rapid growth in the population of Latinos, multicultural consumers especially Latinos, are expected to play an increasingly important role in the affluent consumer market. However, at the present time multicultural households remain underrepresented in the affluent consumer market. They account for 29% of all households but only 20% of affluent households.

There are three million affluent consumers, or approximately 5% of the affluent consumer population, who do not have a high school diploma. However, in general, a high level of educational achievement differentiates affluent from other consumers. While only 16% of other consumers have a college degree or more, 43% of affluent consumers have undergraduate or graduate degrees.

In general, affluent consumers are less likely than other consumers to live in small towns and rural areas outside the 100 largest metropolitan areas (43% vs. 50%). The super-affluent are especially likely to live in the 10 largest metro areas. The New York metropolitan area contains more affluent households by far than any other metro area in the United States. The 2.1 million affluent households in the New York metro area represent 9% of all affluent households.