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[platocplx]

If current economic trends continue, the average black household will need 228 years to accumulate as much wealth as their white counterparts hold today. For the average Latino family, it will take 84 years. Absent significant policy interventions, or a seismic change in the American economy, people of color will never close the gap.

Those are the key findings of a new study of the racial wealth-gap released this week by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and the Corporation For Economic Development (CFED). They looked at trends in household wealth from 1983 to 2013—a 30-year period that captured the rise of Reaganomics, expanded international trade and two major financial crashes fueled by bubbles in the tech sector and housing prices. The authors found that the average wealth of white households increased by 84 percent during those three decades, three times the gains African-American families saw and 1.2 times the rate of growth for Latino families.

To put that in perspective, the wealthiest Americans—members of the Forbes 400 list—saw their net worths increase by 736 percent during that period, on average.



It took 400 years of slavery, segregation, and institutionalized discrimination in the labor and housing markets to build the wealth gap that we see today. For example, by the time the Fair Housing Act made discrimination in housing illegal in 1968, people of color had missed out on decades of robust growth in the housing markets (and much of the next generation missed out on that wealth building in the 20 years it took to fully implement the law). “The racial wealth divide is how the past shows up in the present,” Chuck Collins tells The Nation. “We have a deep legacy of wealth inequality that undermines the whole idea that we have a meritocracy—that there’s an equal playing field.”

The racial wealth gap continues to grow not only because of income inequality—whites have more dollars to sock away—but because accumulated wealth is a mechanism for transmitting economic success from generation to generation. It’s a vicious cycle—poor communities have limited tax bases to fund their public-school systems, which lead to sharp disparities in educational quality. A family with some assets can help their kids pay for an education or put a down payment on a first home or kick them some seed money to start a small business. All of those things help the next generation climb the economic ladder. Wealth also provides an important cushion against unexpected shocks—things like temporary job losses or unexpected medical bills. If you’ve got some wealth, you can weather the storm without getting over your head in debt.

More here:
https://www.thenation.com/article/t...-to-build-the-wealth-of-a-white-family-today/


Heard this on NPR and its pretty crazy to see how this unfolds. Disparities in income is one of the worst things in the US today, Honestly I dont know how can this be rectified right now.

one solution was offered was the following:

 They include one proposal that’s been around for a while: giving every baby born in the United States a savings account with a modest sum, and then using public funds to match what low-income households are able to save. When a young person hits 18, the accounts could then be used to help finance a college education, or to buy a first home or start a new business. Any remaining funds would be dedicated to retirement.

There’s certainly room to debate the best policies for addressing the racial wealth gap, but the report published this week confirms that if we do nothing it will just continue to grow, and any semblance of a level economic playing field in the United States will remain ever elusive.

Overall ive known this for a while the wealth gap in this country is pretty insane, Honestly I think the ONLY way that we could rectify is by offering tax breaks to companies and individuals where pay meets a certain ratio that is acceptable between what executive pay is and common worker pay is. Also offering breaks to companies that instead of offering layoffs they cut salary at the top rung to offset a number of layoffs etc also just in general how compensation for workers is done top to bottom.

overally pretty intresting report.

if you'd like to read the full report here it is: http://cfed.org/policy/federal/The_Ever_Growing_Gap-CFED_IPS-Final.pdf

Also even with some older data this recent study pretty much reaffirms this amazing website:http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/

If anyone wants to get a great understanding of wealth disparity in the US this is a great resource.

 

[Slayven]

Black people be lazy, what they been doing since 1788?

 

[EatinOlives]

Boy that's a lot of bootstraps

 

[platocplx]

Boy that's a lot of bootstraps

LMAO, seriously. if you look at it, looking at how policy deprived people of color a lot of shit, or lost out on lucrative property etc, then compound it by generational wealth passed down its a lot.

 

[Matsukaze]

This is one of those topics where the title alone was enough to make my jaw drop.

I can't even begin to articulate my thoughts on this. I mean holy shit.

That baby savings account idea does sound interesting. I'll have to read up more on that.

 

[Two Words]

So many people don't get just how set back black people in America are. Black people weren't even considered beings with basic human rights until barely 150 years ago. Even after that, they were still significantly limited by legal barriers for another 100 years. This is generation after generation being stuck in the mud while whites were able to continuously prosper and allow for their offsprings to partake in their prosperity. The past 50 years have been better, but still not close to fair-leveled. Racism is still pervasive and the people in power today were raised by people who lived in a time when being publicly racist was normal. The generation in power today is basically a barrel of spoiled apples. Even if they are not KKK racist, they've been plagued by being around it so much that they are often indifferent to it or casually commit less atrocious acts of racism/prejudice. It's going to take many generations for racism to decay out of our society.

 

[Viewt]

Utterly depressing, if not terribly surprising. Sure, being white doesn't automatically get you to the finish line, but being born black gets you shot in the leg and dropped off a town over.

 

[platocplx]

So many people don't get just how set back black people in America are. Black people weren't even considered beings with basic human rights until barely 150 years ago. Even after that, they were still significantly limited by legal barriers for another 100 years. This is generation after generation being stuck in the mud while whites were able to continuously prosper and allow for their offsprings to partake in their prosperity. The past 50 years have been better, but still not close to fair-leveled. Racism is still pervasive and the people in power today were raised by people who lived in a time when being publicly racist was normal. The generation in power today is basically a barrel of spoiled apples. Even if they are not KKK racist, they've been plagued by being around it so much that they are often indifferent to it or casually commit less atrocious acts of racism/prejudice. It's going to take many generations for racism to decay out of our society.

ive always felt that it takes just as long as bad shit that happened to a people for it to be rectified to some level of its effects erased away. And looking at that number its pretty much 9 generations(a generation measured in 25 year increments) of some level of prosperity to erase a lot of these effects.

 

[Ponn]

There is truth here but overall wealth imbalance that has been going on in that same time frame throws the percentages off. Eliminate the top 1% and those numbers will change for everyone, they will still be bad for minorities no argument there. The lack of minorities in that top 1% is questionable on its own.

 

[Dai101]

Black people be lazy, what they been doing since 1788?

Surviving. Literally.

 

[PeterLegend]

Where my asians at???

 

[platocplx]

Where my asians at???

They couldnt get adequate information.

 Like other studies of the racial wealth gap, it excluded Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, Native Americans, and other people of color because of limitations in the underlying data.

they went back about 30 years so they studied the two largest minorities, but I would assume for Asian it would be at a lower rate than Latino.

 

[entremet]

Interesting article.

I've always known this but good to see some reporting.

America really is messed when it comes to how Blacks were and are treated. Burning and torching black communities post Slavery was also common.

 

[yanipheonu]

But they said if I worked hard enough I could have everything I ever wanted!

America, for me, is often characterized by the optimism of the average person that things will get better... And people abusing that belief.

 

[Trojita]

So they didn't even do proper pruning of outliers?

Besides that, this is shameful. Fuck Reaganomics.

 

[platocplx]

But they said if I worked hard enough I could have everything I ever wanted!

Yeah its the biggest lie ever told to Americans.

I read a book about how to become a billionares and they boiled it down to:
Taking advantage of as many opportunities as possible.

Taking huge but well calculated risks and seeing them though.

Buying er.. I mean lobbying congress for your business agenda

Then a lot has been a lot of old money where guys like Rockefeller had monopolies at the time.

Most of the wealth accumulated today is through property ownership and stocks and bonds. Not having a crazy startup lol.

 

[FartOfWar]

They couldnt get adequate information.



they went back about 30 years so they studied the two largest minorities, but I would assume for Asian it would be at a lower rate than Latino.

On average, Asian men in America earn more than white men. And Asian women not only earn more than white women but more than Latino and Black men. Sources: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016...onomic-forum+(Inside+The+World+Economic+Forum) and http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/archive/women-in-the-labor-force-a-databook-2015.pdf
If you believe racism alone is sufficient to explain all unequal outcomes, you're stuck arguing that whites in the US are racist against themselves in favor of Asians. And since that position is untenable, Asians are typically omitted in such arguments.

 

[BLACK AMERICAN PSYCHO]

Asians are usually left out of these studies due to them not wanting to admit that they make nore. 100% convinced at this point.

 

[platocplx]

On average, Asian men in America earn more than white men. And Asian women not only earn more than white women but more than Latino and Black men. Sources: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016...onomic-forum+(Inside+The+World+Economic+Forum) and http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/archive/women-in-the-labor-force-a-databook-2015.pdf
If you believe racism alone is sufficient to explain all unequal outcomes, you're stuck arguing that whites in the US are racist against themselves in favor of Asians. And since that position is untenable, Asians are typically omitted in such arguments.

The sample size for asian populations are a lot lower as well,asian populations make up 5.6%
While latino 17% and black 12% make up.

Also no one is claiming it is racism alone. Poverty intersects race a lot. But the major piece you are missing is that asian populations came here of their free will and that also allowed them to assimilate even with anti asian American laws(chinese exclusion act) world war camps etc, there havent been as many laws that have targeted them as much as other racial groups.

For example you can look up post abolition where they were arresting people of color and handing out their labor to corporations etc.

Again racism alone isnt a piece of it however asian Americans as a whole are able to some degree to assimilate and be "non threatening" than other people color.

 

[Darryl M R]

So I'm 23. . only need 205 more years until I'm building my own for profit University.

 

[AbortedWalrusFetus]

Average does not seem to be a very good measure to use for something like this.

 

[BLACK AMERICAN PSYCHO]

Average does not seem to be a very good measure to use for something like this.

Why?

 

[AbortedWalrusFetus]

Why?

Averages get thrown off by extreme values. One billionaire in a group could make the average of that group massively inflated, for example. I am still reading but you would want to use median for something like this I would imagine. It's fine to point out that most wealth lies with white American's, obviously. It seems like it would be more useful though if you were comparing the most common values with each other if you wanted a better picture of true inequality.

 

[Guevara]

Average does not seem to be a very good measure to use for something like this.

Yes, median would make more sense. A huge percent of the wealth and the increase in wealth over this period is represented by the top 1% as indicated.

However my real problem with this is:

"The authors found that the average wealth of white households increased by 84 percent during those three decades, three times the gains African-American families saw and 1.2 times the rate of growth for Latino families."​

If this were true, black families would never catch up, in fact they'd keep falling back.

Example: if your car goes 30 mph and my car goes 90 mph, you will never catch me.

 

[AbortedWalrusFetus]

Yes, median would make more sense. A huge percent of the wealth and the increase in wealth over this period is represented by the top 1% as indicated.

However my real problem with this is:

"The authors found that the average wealth of white households increased by 84 percent during those three decades, three times the gains African-American families saw and 1.2 times the rate of growth for Latino families."​

If this were true, black families would never catch up, in fact they'd keep falling back.

Right, but it's still average. If you excluded the top 1% of whites as a separate group you could potentially find that whites ALSO would be falling back. The real (or additional) bullet point could be that only the extremely wealthy are getting any wealthier. Reading through this there's really no way to differentiate and see if it's race as a factor or extreme wealth that's the factor (it's probably both).

 

[SheHateMe]

Yeah its the biggest lie ever told to Americans.

I read a book about how to become a billionares and they boiled it down to:
Taking advantage of as many opportunities as possible.

Taking huge but well calculated risks and seeing them though.

Buying er.. I mean lobbying congress for your business agenda

Then a lot has been a lot of old money where guys like Rockefeller had monopolies at the time.

Most of the wealth accumulated today is through property ownership and stocks and bonds. Not having a crazy startup lol.

I agree with all of this, but let me add something: in order to be wealthy, I personally have to not give a FUCK about my fellow human being. I can't care about you, your family, your friends, your coworkers, nothing. I have to literally become morally bankrupt in order to amass wealth, because the moment you get a soft heart and start caring, you start losing money.

Take Flint, for instance. Any one of the major drink corporations could step in and change all of that in an instant, but then who will buy the water bottles to send to Flint? I'm LOSING money by caring about people.

I don't have time for that. I gotta make my $37,000 this second.

 

[platocplx]

Right, but it's still average. If you excluded the top 1% of whites as a separate group you could potentially find that whites ALSO would be falling back. The real (or additional) bullet point could be that only the extremely wealthy are getting any wealthier. Reading through this there's really no way to differentiate and see if it's race as a factor or extreme wealth that's the factor (it's probably both).

Its both, its more like the majority of us have it bad. Its just that it is compounded due to race because the impacts of things like reganomics, then things like where people were cheated out of homes and property before the fair housing acts there has been policy that has helped to make it worse.

Check out the other link i posted by a sociologist it goes into great detail as well. This study is more just a supplement to a long held thing.

I agree with all of this, but let me add something: in order to be wealthy, I personally have to not give a FUCK about my fellow human being. I can't care about you, your family, your friends, your coworkers, nothing. I have to literally become morally bankrupt in order to amass wealth, because the moment you get a soft heart and start caring, you start losing money.

Take Flint, for instance. Any one of the major drink corporations could step in and change all of that in an instant, but then who will buy the water bottles to send to Flint? I'm LOSING money by caring about people.

I don't have time for that. I gotta make my $37,000 this second.

Yep its true, higher up you go and more you make you see many people transition their attitudes when literally they were there at one point as well. And honestly anyone that treat govt like its a business are the worst people you can have in office

 

[Palette Swap]

This is why discussing reparations isn't useless, and isn't necessarily about handouts but offsetting very real inequalities you can't simply throw under the rug with "try harder".

Black people be lazy, what they been doing since 1788?

Being hung, hunted down, burned, shot, dehumanizingly staring, generally making white people uncomfortable, and blocking ambulances that could have almost existed.

 

[Pagusas]

I agree with all of this, but let me add something: in order to be wealthy, I personally have to not give a FUCK about my fellow human being. I can't care about you, your family, your friends, your coworkers, nothing. I have to literally become morally bankrupt in order to amass wealth, because the moment you get a soft heart and start caring, you start losing money.

Take Flint, for instance. Any one of the major drink corporations could step in and change all of that in an instant, but then who will buy the water bottles to send to Flint? I'm LOSING money by caring about people.

I don't have time for that. I gotta make my $37,000 this second.

I wonder how long it took Scrooge to go poor after the events of a Christmas Carol.

 

[AbortedWalrusFetus]

Its both, its more like the majority of us have it bad. Its just that it is compounded due to race because the impacts of things like reganomics, then things like where people were cheated out of homes and property before the fair housing acts there has been policy that has helped to make it worse.

Yeah I'm not saying the underlying premise is wrong, just mostly that it doesn't seem like the numbers from it are actually all that useful because they're framed in a way that can make them look as extreme as possible.

 

[ezrarh]

When institutions are out there to literally prevent you from gaining any wealth...yeah, this is no shock. You can't fully get rid of racism in people but you can change your institutions so they don't actively work against minorities.

 

[platocplx]

I wonder how long it took Scrooge to go poor after the events of a Christmas Carol.

I think thats the funny thing. There is literally a point where the money some of the highest people make its literally useless.

Ive been on projects that a billion dollars or they have to spend money and its hard as hell to spend through. Lol

Thats why there has to be something done to curb the hoarding of money we are seeing.

 

[AndyD]

Right, but it's still average. If you excluded the top 1% of whites as a separate group you could potentially find that whites ALSO would be falling back. The real (or additional) bullet point could be that only the extremely wealthy are getting any wealthier. Reading through this there's really no way to differentiate and see if it's race as a factor or extreme wealth that's the factor (it's probably both).

Indeed. They should have eliminated the 1% regardless of race. The 1% vs. rest is it's own discrepancy, but it also serves to skew this data.

 

[platocplx]

Yeah I'm not saying the underlying premise is wrong, just mostly that it doesn't seem like the numbers from it are actually all that useful because they're framed in a way that can make them look as extreme as possible.

If you think about the timeline of years and match it to even when slavery was abolished it pretty much aligns with the time frame of today. Black people missed out on a lot of the early wealth accumulating peroids in the US, such as the gold rush,industrial revolution etc because they as a whole even with new immigrants have been treated as an underclass, and to a silghtly lesser extent latino.

Even if we cant agree on the number. I think we all can say it will take generations to undue a lot of stuff, and its important to look at ways to slow down the amount of wealth hoarding thats occuring in the US today.

 

[Slayven]

This is why discussing reparations isn't useless, and isn't necessarily about handouts but offsetting very real inequalities you can't simply throw under the rug with "try harder".


Being hung, hunted down, burned, shot, dehumanizingly staring, generally making white people uncomfortable, and blocking ambulances that could have almost existed.

Going by Texas state history books 3/5ths of that stuff never happened

 

[Vengal]

Somewhat curious to see what their polling sizes were. For example I have family in Kentucky who are at this point almost as bad off as their great grandparents from the great depression. Thats one side of my family the other unfortunately are not from the US nor a very friendly part of the world so that likely wouldn't be a useful statistic nor is there much historic data available.

I however know I am making less money comparatively then my parents were in the 80s.

If they're including the upper bell in this data then its really disingenuous. Without a doubt I would guess white people have a significant advantage (i'm half white) but it would take hundreds of years for just about anyone to amass the level of wealth that people in power right now have.

 

[AndyD]

If they're including the upper bell in this data then its really disingenuous. Without a doubt I would guess white people have a significant advantage (i'm half white) but it would take hundreds of years for just about anyone to amass the level of wealth that people in power right now have.

Indeed. I would guess the median white family would still take 150 years or some ungodly time frame to get to 1%.

 

[Mr. X]

On average, Asian men in America earn more than white men. And Asian women not only earn more than white women but more than Latino and Black men. Sources: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016...onomic-forum+(Inside+The+World+Economic+Forum) and http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/archive/women-in-the-labor-force-a-databook-2015.pdf
If you believe racism alone is sufficient to explain all unequal outcomes, you're stuck arguing that whites in the US are racist against themselves in favor of Asians. And since that position is untenable, Asians are typically omitted in such arguments.

Asians have the "perks" of positive stereotypes wrt work ethic.

 

[Little Green Yoda]

Asians have the "perks" of positive stereotypes wrt work ethic.

Or you know, they tend to live on the coasts and in more urban areas where salaries/wages are higher...

 

[Infinite]

On average, Asian men in America earn more than white men. And Asian women not only earn more than white women but more than Latino and Black men. Sources: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016...onomic-forum+(Inside+The+World+Economic+Forum) and http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/archive/women-in-the-labor-force-a-databook-2015.pdf
If you believe racism alone is sufficient to explain all unequal outcomes, you're stuck arguing that whites in the US are racist against themselves in favor of Asians. And since that position is untenable, Asians are typically omitted in such arguments.

Or you believe that blacks and brown Latinos were the targets of such racial oppression.

 

[Htown]

Indeed. They should have eliminated the 1% regardless of race. The 1% vs. rest is it's own discrepancy, but it also serves to skew this data.

It doesn't skew the data. The fact that there aren't many black people in the 1% is part of the data.

 

[giga]

Haven't read it yet, but does the study account for bootstraps? It's actually very common to miss that so I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't.

 

[GreatestHits]

YUGE surprise. Yuge.

Those unfortunate people simply need an intimate date with bootstraps. Byutestraps.

 

[1.21Gigawatts]

But white privilege isn't real because I can't use the n-word and Barraco Barner is black.

 

[kadath]

In my experience, 99% of white people drive lambos and live in mansions with golf courses in their backyards

 

[nicanica]

What did you expect?

They said trickle.
Not pour.

 

[Romez]

Nobody should be surprised about this.

 

[jaxpunk]

According to this the average white household is $656,000. haha what.

 

[Iorv3th]

According to this the average white household is $656,000. haha what.

I'm way below average for a white man.

 

[poppabk]

According to this the average white household is $656,000. haha what.

Yeah, taking a mean and applying it to everyone is bad statistics when the data isn't normally distributed.