With regard to the original question, I would say that in a number of cases - principally houses and the stock market - the wealth never really existed.
Take housing. Imagine starting with one million houses, each with average value £100K. Valuation of total housing stock £100 billion. A few (doesn't take many) houses change hands at - say - £110K. Now the valuation of total housing stock is set at £110K x 1million, i.e. £110 billion. Hence, we see an apparent increas in the country's wealth of £10billiion, despite the fact only a fraction of the house changed hands at the higher price and there is NO more money in the country than at the start point.
With houses, when valuations increase, people feel wealthier, borrow against this apparent increase in their wealth, spend more, business do better, share prices go up....everything feels great.
Same occurs with the stock market. Just a few of a company's shares need to trade at a higher price and the company (due to having many million shares) is valued massively higher.
I don't have an answer to all this, but it suggests (to me at least) our method of valuing "wealth" is wrong