Description

This paper summarizes the main results from the la test household panel survey (Social Protection Survey 2004/05 about the distribution of assets, de bt and income across Chilean households. Several appealing conclusions can be drawn. First of all, it is worth stressing that a relatively small proportion of households hold a large share of debts, assets and income. In particular, the richest quintile concentrates 57% and 43% of debts and assets, respec tively. Overall, households that hold the largest share of the debt are composed by young adults with higher education and formal employment contracts. The analysis also shows that, for th e vast majority of households, 80%, their assets are greater than their liabilities, and hence, they are financially less vulnerable to changes in macroeconomic and financial cond itions. Only 4% of households register negative net worth and a heavy debt service burden. This highly vulner able group concentrates 9% of total debt.