Racial dimensions and inequality. Mathematics Research Paper

Racial Dimensions and Inequality
Name
Institution
Due Date
Racial Dimensions and Inequality
Introduction
Every year, news about the economy is peddled to the public and one thing that is often said and repeated is that the economy is doing well. Well, when something is said to be doing well, it is always relative to something else. For the economy, it is always juxtaposed with the past and it is true that the economy is doing well than it was doing 10 or 20 years ago. However, the question people fail to ask is whether this change benefits everyone or whether everyone within the U.S. borders takes part in this growth. As Costa (2019) reports, “a steady economic expansion and historically low jobless rate can mask deep inequalities in income and wealth that leave American families in vastly different financial situations.” The above is true because as the economy continues to get stronger and some people are getting wealthier, the larger percentage is not. As seen in the image shown below wealth for the top 10% continues to increase as those at the bottom continue to languish in poverty. The image as Costa (2019) explains shows that “while the total net worth of U.S. households has more than quadrupled in nominal terms since 1989, this increase has clearly accrued more to the top of the distribution than the bottom.” In other words, inequality has continued to rise albeit reports that the economy is doing well. Inequality along racial lines further reveals a dark secret in the American economy that is not often showcased by media houses. Apparently, for white households, there has been a tremendous increase in wealth. However, the African American and Hispanic communities seem to have different reports as their families continue to languish in cyclical poverty. Taking from the above statement, this article seeks to delve deeper into the issue of racial dimensions and inequality. The aim is to provide a clearer view of how wealth is currently being distributed along racial lines, the cyclical impacts of the above, the reasons behind the inequality, and defining the effects of closing the wealth gap.
How bad is the Wealth Gap historically and currently?
There had been reports that the white community would soon be a minority in the U.S. The New Census population projections confirmed this and as indicated by Frey (2018), racial minorities will be the “primary demographic engine of the nation’s future growth, countering an aging, slow-growing and soon to be declining white population.” As per statistics currently being propagated, the white community will be a majority by 1945 (Frey, 2018). Even though this is happening, family wealth by race/ethnicity continues to widen as minority families still continue to languish in poverty. As indicated in the image shown below, between 1963 and 2016, the white families have increased their wealth capacities further and seem to showcase a wider disparity compared to the minority families. The Urban.org (2017) reports that “in 1963, the average wealth of white families was $121,000 higher than the average wealth of nonwhite families.” However, by 2016, this number has soared and currently, “the average wealth of white families ($919,000) was over $700,000 higher than the average wealth of black families ($140,000) and of Hispanic families ($192,000).” These numbers paint a dull picture for the economy of the U.S. It is true as already indicated that the economy is growing but this appears to be more lucrative to some people while the majority continues to languish in poverty.
One absolute fact in the U.S. today is that there is a lot of wealth being held by American households. Sawhill and Pulliam (2019) report that “American households held over $98 trillion of wealth in 2018.” So, American households are a lot wealthier than they were a few years back. The amount of assets these households hold is said to be $113 trillion and Samhill and Pulliam (2019) write that this figure is “over five times as much as all the goods and services produced in the U.S. economy in a single year.” The only dirt in the above statistic is that along racial lines, white communities have a lot more wealth than everyone else in the country. But what might be behind this disparity? What are some of the reasons behind this inequality?
Reasons behind the Inequality
One of the reasons why inequality along racial lines persists is that differences in earnings have been adding up over lifetimes and thus continue to widen the racial and ethnic wealth gap in the U.S. Racial wealth gaps continue to rise in the U.S. and this is mainly as a result of cyclical gaps that continue to be normalized in the U.S. Patten (2016) writes that “all groups, with the exception of Asian men, lag behind white men in terms of median hourly earnings.” She continues to write that “in 2015, average hourly wages for black and Hispanic men were $15 and $14, respectively, compared with $21 for white men.” For the Asian men, things were much better as they received $24 a number that dwarfed even that of white men. It is such statistics that condemn non-white Americans into cyclical poverty. When wages are distributed along racial lines, some families are given a little chance to excel. In the end, these ratings shape the futures of these families and hence the widening inequality.
There is also a lack of wealth-building schemes among non-white families. Even though there is an aspect of power, life’s chances, and the distribution of economic resources, one has to also consider how knowledge is passed on from one generation to the next. For the non-white families, wea...