Does the measurement of the racial wealth gap shift depending on the model, method, and data set used? We contrast the traditional mean Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition with the distributional Recentered Influence Function (RIF) methods. The untransformed, logarithm-transformed, and inverse hyperbolic sine-transformed versions in both Survey of Consumer Finances and Panel Study of Income Dynamics data sets exhibit similarities. The Oaxaca-Blinder (mean) decomposition highlights that receiving an inheritance explains a larger portion of the racial wealth gap than educational attainment. Conversely, the RIF method at the median suggests that educational attainment accounts for more of the wealth gap than inheritance receipt.

This statistic shows the median household wealth in the United States in 2016, by race. In 2016, the median Black household wealth was 17,600 U.S. dollars.

PSID data extract for computing per capita white-to-Black wealth gaps and active saving rates of Black and white Americans during 1984-2019.

This study analyzed de-identified secondary data from participants who self-identified as African American/Black, was listed as the owner on the deed, was aged 18 years or older, and completed the closing process between January 1, 2014, and December 31, 2021. Using repeated measures of ANOVA statistical analysis, data were examined from 20 Black households from three programmatic collection points: application, program approval, and closing. Statistically significant changes were found in the following primary outcomes: gross monthly income, collections debt, credit scores, and debt-to-income ratio from the time of program application to closing.

The median income in 2023 was at 56,490 U.S. dollars for Black households. In 1990, the median income among Black households was 38,360 U.S. dollars (In 2023 U.S. dollars).

Graph and download economic data for Net Change in Total Assets by Race: White, Asian, and All Other Races, Not Including Black or African American (CXUCHGASSETLB0902M) from 1984 to 2023 about change, asian, white, Net, assets, and USA.

Americans remain largely unaware of the magnitude of economic inequality in the nation and the degree to which it is patterned by race. In the present research we exposed a community sample of respondents to one of three interventions designed to promote a more realistic understanding of the Black-White wealth gap. The interventions were developed to conform to best practices in messaging about racial inequality drawn from the social sciences, yet differed in the extent to which they highlighted a single story versus data-based trends in Black-White wealth inequality or both. The interventions that highlighted data versus only a single story of racial inequality were most effective in both shifting how people talk about racial wealth inequality—eliciting less speech about personal achievement—and, critically, improving accuracy in perceptions of the Black-White wealth gap. These increases in accuracy persisted up to 18 months following the intervention, though accuracy did decline across time. The initial findings from this study highlight how data can be leveraged, along with current recommendations in the social sciences, to promote more accurate understandings of the magnitude of racial inequality in society, laying the necessary groundwork for messaging about equity-enhancing policy.

In the U.S., median household income rose from 51,570 U.S. dollars in 1967 to 80,610 dollars in 2023. In terms of broad ethnic groups, Black Americans have consistently had the lowest median income in the given years, while Asian Americans have the highest; median income in Asian American households has typically been around double that of Black Americans.

The difference in the average wealth of Black and white Americans narrowed in the first century after the Civil War, but remained large and even widened again after 1980. Given high levels of wealth concentration both historically and today, dynamics at the average may not capture important heterogeneity in racial wealth gaps across the distribution. This paper looks into the historical evolution of the Black and white wealth distributions since Emancipation. The picture that emerges is an even starker one than racial wealth inequality at the mean. Tracing, for the first time, the evolution of wealth of the median Black household and the gap between the typical Black and white household over time, we estimate that the majority of Black households only began to dispose of measurable wealth around World War II. While the civil rights era brought substantial wealth gains for the median Black household, the gap between Black and white wealth at the median has not changed much since the 1970s. The top and the bottom of the wealth distribution show even greater persistence, with Black households consistently over-represented in the bottom half of the wealth distribution and under-represented in the top-10% over the past seven decades.

Graph and download economic data for Other Financial Information: Other Money Receipts by Race: White and All Other Races, Not Including Black or African American (CXUOTHRMONYLB0903M) from 2003 to 2021 about receipts, information, financial, white, and USA.

Replication data for "Racial Segregation in Housing Markets and the Erosion of Black Wealth"

In this paper, we address what has been termed “the Fed view,” the Federal Reserve’s model for black-white wealth inequality, articulated in a series of mutually consistent papers making two arguments. First, the Fed view has it that the black-white wealth gap, when measured with an “expanded wealth concept,” is smaller than previously thought. Second, the Fed view has it that the black-white wealth gap is primarily explained by income differences shaped by personal decisions around human capital acquisition, family structure, risk taking, and the legacy of residential segregation.

A list of the top 50 Black Point Wealth Management holdings showing which stocks are owned by Black Point Wealth Management's hedge fund.

Reparations for African Americans reflect both material concerns aimed at eliminating the Black-White racial wealth gap and symbolic political aspirations, including the end of structural racism. But do material or symbolic considerations drive policy evaluations across racial and partisan divides? What knowledge and experiences undergird processes through which individuals weigh the symbolic importance of a policy against its actual benefits? Leveraging a set of 41 in-depth interviews with Black and White residents of Evanston, Illinois—the first municipality in the U.S. to approve a publicly-funded reparations-related ordinance—we highlight a mechanism through which individuals develop their opinions about reparations: political socialization. Black interviewees linked their understanding of reparations to robust financial compensation while White Democrats viewed their support for Evanston’s policy as symbolic of their longstanding, affective commitments to racial equality. Drawing from these observations, we present a framework highlighting policy attributes that frame how different constituencies respond to reparations-related policies. We test this framework using a conjoint experiment about reparations policies fielded in the 2022 Cooperative Election Study. We find Americans—especially White Republicans—possess less familiarity about reparations and remain strongly opposed to these policies, regardless of the form they take. While White Democrats are more familiar with reparations and more supportive of policies mirroring Evanston’s, Black Americans—those who are most familiar with reparations—support direct cash payments regardless of their political identification.

Graph and download economic data for Other Financial Information: Other Money Receipts by Hispanic or Latino Origin: Not Hispanic or Latino: White and All Other Races, Not Including Black or African American (CXUOTHRMONYLB1004M) from 2003 to 2021 about receipts, information, financial, white, latino, hispanic, and USA.

The City partnered with Burke, Inc. and The Voice of Your Costumer research and marketing firms to conduct a statistically significant survey of over 1,000 residents, including 500 Black/ African American residents to understand barriers around reaching financial freedom. The survey insights uncovered racial disparities around job mobility, housing (rental and homeownership), debt and consumer protection, banking and financial access, and financial planning and coaching.

In 2023, about 26.9 percent of Asian private households in the U.S. had an annual income of 200,000 U.S. dollars and more. Comparatively, around 13.9 percent of Black households had an annual income under 15,000 U.S. dollars.

Graph and download economic data for Income Before Taxes: Income Before Taxes by Race: White, Asian, and All Other Races, Not Including Black or African American (CXUINCBEFTXLB0902M) from 1984 to 2023 about asian, tax, white, income, and USA.

Historical ownership data of CVX by BLACK POINT WEALTH MANAGEMENT

Data and code accompanying "The Racial Wealth Gap and the Role of Firm Ownership"This paper develops an overlapping generations model that isolates the impact of the U.S. racial wealth gap in 1962 on the long-run dynamics of wealth. The model predicts that one component of the initial gap, firm ownership, coupled with the intergenerational transfer of that ownership, results in a permanent wealth gap independent of other dimensions of inequality. This implies that even if all discrimination against black Americans had ceased upon the end of Jim Crow, the wealth gap would have persisted without a reparations policy addressing the fact that the initial firm ownership gap arose in the first place.