Bartscher, Alina K.; Kuhn, Moritz; Schularick, Moritz; … - In: Review of Economic Dynamics 57 (2025), pp. 1-22
Using new household-level data, we study the secular increase in U.S. household debt and its distribution since 1950. Most of the debt were mortgages, which initially grew because more households borrowed. Yet after 1980, debt mostly grew because households borrowed more. We uncover home equity...