America has more millionaires than you think. Here’s how most of them got rich.

September 17, 2026 / 5:00 AM EDT / CBS News

The richest person in your town probably isn't a technology entrepreneur or a hedge fund manager. More likely, it's the dentist who runs six offices or the HVAC contractor whose trucks you see everywhere, according to economists Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick.

These "stealthy wealthy," as the duo describes them in their new book, "The Everywhere Millionaire," typically get rich the old-fashioned way — through hard work over many years. And there are plenty of them in the U.S., with roughly 5 million households worth at least $5 million and holding combined wealth exceeding 13 times that of the Forbes 400, their research shows.

The findings, based on the economists' deep dive into Treasury and IRS data that matched tax records to individual businesses and their owners, show that the path to great wealth in the U.S. typically isn't through a regular paycheck. Instead, it's through ordinary enterprises that often benefit from the same tax breaks and structures — "pass-through" businesses such as sole proprietorships and partnerships.

"This is not just a story about wealth being on the coast, Silicon Valley and finance," Zwick, an economics professor at the University…

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