Bloomberg Surveillance · Monday, July 27, 2026
The projected $124 trillion 'Great Wealth Transfer' over the next two decades is occurring slower than anticipated. Key factors contributing to this slowdown include increased longevity, heirs not feeling ready or responsible enough to inherit, and a fear of changing regulatory and tax environments. While many wealthy individuals intend to leave a charitable legacy, a significant gap exists between intention and actual execution.
“So you're right, you know, we're looking at the so called Great Weald Transfer, the one hundred and twenty four trillion dollars that's expected transfer from the baby boomer generation to the next generation, that the next twenty years. Right, And I will tell you that the great wealth transfer is still happening, but it's happening a little different. It's happening slower, and so I would look at it more as a journey as opposed to us thingle oh.”
“The first is longevity. Right, People are living longer, they're a little bit more worried. So, and the second is is that people do feel like the errors are not quite ready right, and they're not ready to as certain corresponsibility. Yeah, and so and then the third that we found in our survey is actually a fear of changing regulatory and tax environment.”
“But speaking of philanthropy, this is one of the things out to me, was the most startling, most interesting data point from this whole entire report because it highlights the theme, which is that for wealthy families, there is a huge gap between intention and execution. In our survey, for example, we found ninety one percent of our respondent wants to leave a charitable legacy, and guess what, only thirty six per them actually have the plan to do.”