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Home > Forums > Interest Groups > Educational Issues & Concerns Edit Settings  |  Search Forums Black-White Gap in Wealth Mobility Could Affect College Access Posted on 07-30-2008 klg14 Hawthorne, CA The Chronicle of Higher Education Wednesday, July 30, 2008 Black-White Gap in Wealth Mobility Could Affect College Access By PETER SCHMIDT A new report by the Center for American Progress suggests that the educational and economic progress of black families is being hindered by racial gaps in the accumulation of wealth. The report, "Wealth Mobility and Volatility in Black and White," says it is important to examine wealth—and not just income—in studying economic mobility, partly because college costs have risen enough to make family-wealth levels key determinants of who can afford a higher education. At the same time wealth helps determine education access, education access plays an indirect role in the attainment of wealth by being correlated with the incomes of parents and the future earnings of children. White children born to wealthy families are much more likely to become wealthy adults than black children born to such families, says the report by the center, a research organization that promotes progressive social policies. Among those born to families in the top fourth of society in terms of accumulated wealth, 55 percent of white children and 37 percent of black children grow up to be in the top fourth as adults. At the other end of wealth distribution, 35 percent of white children and 44 percent of black children born to families in the bottom fourth end up in the bottom fourth as adults, the report says. Although the researchers did not specifically study what factors account for the black-white gap in wealth accumulation, their report suggests that discrimination in housing, employment, and other areas plays a role. The report also notes that black families in the top fourth tend to be in the bottom of that category, making it more likely, simply as a statistical matter, that they would fall into a lower bracket if they lost any wealth at all. The report is based on an analysis of family-wealth data gathered from 1984 to 2003 as part of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, a national study that follows families and individuals over time. The researchers looked at people who were from 6 to 21 in 1984 and measured their family wealth then and their own wealth in the 1999-to-2003 period, when they were 24 to 40 years old. The report says its findings "indicate the need to provide more educational opportunity and earnings potential for the least-advantaged members of American society" because "without adequate incomes, families cannot save." It recommends that policy makers seek to make wealth a less-important factor in determining how well people are educated. "If we severed the link between local property values and school funding to a greater extent, then we might lessen the 'indirect' effect of parental wealth on one's own wealth," it says. Similar conclusions were reached in a report on upward mobility published in May by the Economic Mobility Project—a collaborative involving the American Enterprise Institute, the Brookings Institution, the Heritage Foundation, and the Urban Institute. That report, by Bhashkar Mazumder, an economist, said the entire black-white gap in upward economic mobility can be explained by gaps in academic-test scores. Both black and white children with the same test scores experienced similar rates of upward mobility, and there was no racial gap in economic mobility among white and black people who had finished four years of college. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright © 2008 by The Chronicle of Higher Education Link to report: Wealth Mobility and Volatility in Black and White   [Reply] Page 1 of 1 1 Reply To Topic In order to post a response to this topic, please login below or click here to signup. Email Address: Password: Page 1 of 1 1 Home > Forums > Interest Groups > Educational Issues & Concerns Edit Profile Post Content Sponsored Content Create an Ad Follow Us! Link To Us! Do you have a website? Link to HBCU Connect! Have a Question? Call Us Direct @ 877.864.4446

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