Racial Wealth Gap Analysis

In the article The Roots of the Widening Racial Wealth Gap: Explaining the Black-White Economic Divide by IASP they were talking about the differences white and black homeowners have in the economy. In today’s society we face a number of problems with buying and paying off a house. He social issues being addressed in this article are not only that Black and white people are treated differently, but also how they are treated unequally. The average white family makes nearly $236,000 more dollars then black families. The five significant factors in this article that are found to be the primary causes of social inequality are; Homeownership, Income and Employment, Inheritance, College Education and Social and Cultural factors. Homeownership tends to affect this the most because if you already own your house then it is much harder to lose it, unless something terrible ended
up happening to your family. Income and Employment also affect this because if you’re making what the average black family makes compared to the average white family you wouldn’t be able to pay of a house for years, if at all. Inheritance can be important in discussing these five because if you inherit a house or a large sum of money you may not be as prone to losing as a house, But that also depends on the dollar of inheritance the family makes, whites make nearly.91, while black make .20 for every dollar. The loss of over 50% of collective wealth I think was because people of color got their home equity nearly 8 years after whites. It is very clear that people of color not only have a lower homeownerships then white people, but they also made a lot less money than white people providing no safety cushion in case something happens. Another thing was the white families had a better chance of being able to give more inheritances and family assistance for down payments unlike blacks. Homeownership is also a significant impact because white family’s homeownership rate is nearly 28.4% above black families. Homeownership, Income, Education and Inheritance are what they think are the contributing factors to why this racial gap is so large.
They are suggesting that we provide better education for both blacks and whites so they can earn more money and succeed better in life. Income is also something that matters because if you’re making 12,000 dollars a year you aren’t going to be able to afford a house in a nicer neighborhood with better schools. Education is obviously one of the biggest things that need to be addressed because without a education or at least a good education, it is much harder to get higher paying jobs and a better income. Finally Inheritance, if you are a wealthy family your inheritance will be much higher rather than if you were a poor family, the wealthier white families have a better inheritance because they earn .91 on the dollar rather than .51 cents on the dollar for blacks. Inheritance affects the poor because the richest families use their money to make more money and keep passing it down to generation to generation; this accounts for the richest 1% of the world’s
population. In this article I believe that a good education and a steady income is what is key for success in reducing the racial gap. While I think that the richest 1% of the world need to start helping the poorest people get a better educations so they can go to college and not be living in poverty their entire lives. On the other hand there is inheritance which I don’t completely agree with because while the poorest people don’t inherit very much the richest making millions and use those millions to make millions more, I think that we should tax them more so we can pour their money into college education and better school in bad neighborhoods.