Income and Wealth

The economic gap between Black people and white people living in The Mississippi Delta continues to be exacerbated by predatory payday lending practices. Since the 1990s, payday lending availability has increased exponentially in Mississippi.

This project will examine two experimental GI studies in Georgia. The first study randomly enrolled 654 Black women to receive a GI for two years, with participants randomized into one of two disbursement models. The second study, embedded in a non-profit serving unhoused individuals, will randomly assign 200 current clients to receive either standard housing support or housing support plus $400/month for one year.

This project will build on and contribute to a growing body of research into the impact of public banks – financial institutions created by governments and chartered to serve the public interest – and their potential to address interlocking health, housing, and climate crises and reduce the racial wealth gap.

Incarceration plays a major role in creating and maintaining the racial wealth gap. And, while guaranteed income (GI) programs have been proposed by academics, legislators, and community members across the country as a way to address the racial wealth gap, little research exists on targeted GI initiatives for justice system-impacted people.

Baby bonds are publicly funded child trust accounts that have been proposed as a solution to build wealth for young adults and reduce racial wealth disparities. Public support for baby bonds is gaining momentum, including federal legislation introduced by Senator Booker (D-NJ) and reintroduced by Senator Booker and Representative Pressley (D-MA).

This project will use the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center's enhanced model to examine how the federal tax treatment of capital income and wealth might affect Black families differently than white families. We will also consider the racial equity effects of alternative tax policies—both those aimed at reducing the tax burden of all capital holders and those that would explicitly redistribute wealth in ways that could narrow the racial wealth gap.

Over the past several years, cash transfer programs have emerged as a unique opportunity to address the systemic barriers lower-income families face in achieving full economic security.

How can intentional lending practices and homebuyer programs in disinvested communities lead to more cohesive, healthier neighborhoods and accelerate the closing of racial wealth gaps?

The study will examine how the effects of minimum wage on health may vary across different demographic groups, particularly targeting women of color.

Reparations are one policy solution that can advance racial equity and justice in the United States and can decrease racial inequities in health and well-being. Yet reparations cannot be truly effective and reparative if they are not deeply accountable to the people who were harmed. Building on the authentic grassroots organizing and meaningful community engagement of the Racial Justice Coalition in Asheville, North Carolina, the research team will utilize qualitative methods to study the local reparations process underway in Asheville and Buncombe County, North Carolina.

This research will provide valuable evidence of the effects of a guaranteed income on families with low incomes and allow other jurisdictions who may be considering similar policies to use the program in Compton, CA as a model.

This project will examine the impact of existing student debt forgiveness policies on racial wealth gaps, specifically on Black-White and Hispanic-White wealth gaps.