The all-American working man demeanor of Tim Walz—Kamala Harris’s new running mate—looks like it’s not just an act.
Financial disclosures show Tim Walz barely has any assets to his name. No stocks, bonds, or even property to call his own. Together with his wife, Gwen, his net worth is $330,000, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal citing financial disclosures from 2019, the year after he became Minnesota governor.
With that kind of meager nest egg, he would be more or less in line with the median figure for Americans his age (he’s 60), and even poorer than the average. One in 15 Americans is a millionaire, a recent UBS wealth report discovered.
Meanwhile, the gross annual income of Walz and his wife, Gwen, amounted to $166,719 before tax in 2022, according to their joint return filed that same year. Walz is even entitled to earn more than the $127,629 salary he receives as state governor, but he has elected not to receive the roughly $22,000 difference.
“Walz represents the stable middle class,” tax lawyer Megan Gorman, who authored a book on the personal finances of U.S. presidents, told the paper.
Military retirement benefits and teachers pensions mean you don’t have to save a ridiculous 401k. Your average American wishes they had that freedom. Not a dig on Walz, just a dig on our retirement and healthcare system.
Do they not count the present value of an annuity when calculating net worth? Seems like a major oversight.
Journalism is all but dead. 6 conglomerates own 95% of our media and now “journalists” P-hack whatever data fits the narrative they are told to push.
Yep. This.
All those pensions and lifetime benefits are worth a lot in financial planning and means you aren’t slaving as hard to build the large nest egg required to actually have a hope of retiring. They put their years of service in to get those benefits. It’s always amazing to me how much having those benefits in someone’s back pocket changes their perspective, it’s a freedom that most Americans will never know.
