Civil rights legislation and the housing status of black americans: Evidence from fair housing audits and segregation indices

The Fair Housing Act of 1968 made discrimination against minorities in the sale or rental of housing illegal. Twenty years later the Act’s coverage was expanded and its enforcement mechanisms strengthened in response to pressure from fair housing advocates and evidence of continued segregation and discrimination. Segregation indices and fair housing audits provide measures of the extent and nature of residential segregation and housing discrimination. High levels of residential segregation suggest that housing discrimination exists, and audits give a direct measure of the incidence of discrimination. To date, housing audits consistently show that black auditors encounter discriminatory treatment in the housing search process. Whether the strengthened enforcement mechanisms of the Act will have a substantial impact on housing market discrimination and, in turn, residential segregation, remains to be seen.     

Housing problems and prospects for blacks in Houston

Houston was considered the premier Sunbelt city in the 1970s. Much of the growth during this boom period was fueled by the oil industry. The city led the nation in new jobs created and housing starts. The economic growth, however, was not uniformly distributed to all segments of the population-specifically, a large segment of the black community was passed over during the city’s housing boom. Many of the housing problems facing black Houstonians can be traced to the city’s anti-public housing sentiment, policies that create and perpetuate racial segregation, and the dismantling of the fair housing enforcement mechanism. Housing discrimination, residential segregation, and other institutional barriers all limit the mobility options for a sizable segment of the black Houston community.     

Black-white housing price differentials: Recent trends and implications

Black-white housing price differentials consistent with racially discriminatory practices are rarely found by the studies that have used post-1970 data. Instead, those studies report price differentials consistent with the theory that whites buy segregation by bidding up the price of housing in certain neighborhoods. Unfortunately, the specifications used in most of these studies have been flawed. Here, a properly specified model is estimated using Annual Housing Survey data, augmented with objective measures of neighborhood conditions, from Grand Rapids, Michigan. The price differentials found support the trend found by the improperly specified models. Specifically, various owner bundles cost up to 16 percent more and various renter bundles cost up to 20 percent more in the predominantly white than in the predominantly black submarket. To the extent that residential integration remains one of society’s goals, this trend calls for innovative policies that go beyond enforcement of existing Fair Housing laws.     

What else do unions do?: Race and gender in local 35

Most analyses of the relationship between job segregation and gender wage inequality do not examine the race-specific dimensions of occupational segregation. Using personnel data, we examine the impact of race-gender occupational segregation on occupational grading and wage setting within a service and maintenance union. Our empirical results show that the job grading and wage setting processes significantly favor white men’s jobs and penalize black women’s jobs.     

Austrian Business Cycle Theory, Keynes’s General Theory, Soaring Wheat Prices, and Subprime Mortgage Write-Downs

Keynes’s presentation of own rates of interest on wheat and housing is set within Austrian business cycle theory, to show that soaring wheat prices and subprime mortgage writedowns are expected, when a monetary authority holds interest rates too low for too long. From that basis, further interest rate cuts are an unlikely remedy for a recession whose roots lie in a proliferation of credit.     

Consumer demand by Black Americans

This article investigates the consumption patterns of black Americans for five different commodity groups: food, housing, clothing, health care, and transportation. The black consumer’s demand for these products is hypothesized as describable by the linear expenditure system. The system allows the investigation of changing relative commodity prices and income. The system also establishes a basic consumption bundle as an estimable parameter of the system. The basic bundle allows for changes in composition due to increased product familiarity, habit formation, and emulation by black consumers. Product familiarity and habit-formation play a role in determining the black consumer’s demand for the commodities food, housing, and clothing. This demand is also partially determined by the consumer’s “emulation” of consumption standards established by society in general. The article is not a comparison study of black-white differences in consumer behavior; however, the possible existence of an emulation effect in black consumer behavior suggests an interrelation of black-white consumer welfare which might fruitfully be studied by future researchers.     

The role of housing vouchers in baltimore city,Maryland

In Baltimore City, the relative well-being of black and white families using Section 8 housing vouchers versus Section 8 housing certificates is compared. Logistic regression is used to examine whether the social and economic characteristics of a regional planning district play a significantly different role in the likelihood that a district will have voucher or certificate recipients. A second analysis examines the average monthly rent paid by blacks and whites for housing in the certificate and voucher programs. The results suggest that whites receive greater economic benefits in the voucher program than in the certificate program while blacks do not. This article is based on a paper entitled /’’ The Impact of Housing Vouchers on the Black Family,” which was funded by the Baltimore Urban League and presented at the National Conference of Political Scientist, March 1989.     

Assessing black progress: voting and citizenship rights,residency and housing,education

Farley discusses progress US blacks have made in the areas of voting and citizenship rights, residency and housing, and education. A major goal of the civil rights movement was to permit blacks to influence the electoral process in the same manner as whites. Most important in this regard was the Voting Rights Act of 1965; the proportion of southern blacks casting ballots increased sharply since the early 1960s. The Civil Rights Act of 1875 outlawed racial segregation in public accommodations, but by the turn of the century, Jim Crow laws in southern states called for segregation in most public places. Common customs and government policy in the North resulted in similar segregation of blacks from whites. The Montgomery bus boycott and similar protests in dozens of other cities led to enactment of Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which proscribed such racial practices. By the late 1960s, blacks in all regions could use the same public accommodations as whites. In most metropolitan areas, de facto racial segregation persisted long after the laws were changed. Supreme Court decisions and local open-housing ordinances supported the right of blacks to live where they could afford. However the major change was the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which outlawed racial discrimination in the sale or rental of most housing units. The separation of blacks from whites did not end in the 1970s. Today, in areas which have large black populations, there are many central city neighborhoods and a few in the suburbs which are either all-black or are becoming exclusively black enclaves. Most other neighborhoods have no more than token black populations. Another major effort of civil rights organizations has been the upgrading of housing quality for blacks. By 1980, only 6% of the homes and apartments occupied by blacks lacked complete plumbing facilities (down from 50% in 1940). Unlike the modest changes in residential segregation, racial differences in housing quality have been greatly reduced. By 1960, black students approached parity with whites in terms of measurable aspects of school facilities. In 1940, young blacks averaged about 3 fewer years of educational attainment than whites; the time is nearing when the years of schooling completed by blacks and whites will be the same. In small and medium-sized cities throughout the country, public schools are generally integrated. However, the situation in the largest metropolitan areas is very different. Today, large public schools are segregated, in large part, because blacks and whites live in separate school districts.     

Interregional migration of labor in Ghana,West Africa: Determinants,consequences and policy intervention

This article examines the determinants, consequences and policy intervention measures of the movement of labor within Ghana’s administrative regions. The study concludes that the economic inequalities brought about by the uneven distribution of development projects in favor of urban areas causes depressed rural economic conditions, thus spurring rural to urban migration. Migration to the urban places of Ghana is therefore caused by individuals and families seeking better economic opportunities to improve the quality of their lives. Secondary determinants are varied, ranging from family obligations to the quest for adventure. The benefits of migration for the rural areas lie mainly in returned migrants’ contributions to the economic development of those areas. Migrants also contribute to the urban areas’ economic development, but their presence in large numbers has caused problems in the housing and in the delivery of social services. Rural development policies and land settlement schemes have been unsuccessful, due mainly to the lack of a comprehensive national development effort.     

The case for rules in the conduct of monetary policy: A critique on a paper by B.T. McCallum

Conclusion Certainly these last comments lead to the question what should be targeted: the growth rate [as for example in Gordon’s 1985 work] or the level as in Hall [1983] or McCallum [1988] or no targeting at all [like in Friedman 1960; 1968; 1985] or Meltzer [1984; 1987]. Since targeting GNP growth rates might lead to instability and overshooting effects as Taylor [1985] points out, altering rule (1) in that way is not appropriate. But targeting on the levels may not reduce fluctuations in growth rates or prevent cycles at all. If the latter are, however, more important in public opinion, a policy problem emerges. To summarize the last comment in a figurative way: McCallum’s rule prevents inflation in the long run and may prevent fluctuations in terms of half a Kondratieff cycle, but it preserves and intensifies Juglar and shorter cycles.     

Recent changes in the housing status of blacks in los angeles

In the aftermath of reductions in federal housing assistance programs during the 1980s, many cities are experiencing severe shortages of affordable housing. It is particularly difficult for low income and minority households to find and maintain adequate, low-cost housing. This article describes how Los Angeles has responded to this need through implementation of a particular housing policy and financing strategy. It specifically examines what impacts this program has had in producing affordable housing in the city’s low-income, minority neighborhoods. Recommendations for further public action on housing needs in Los Angeles are also offered.     

Differentiating Indexation in Dutch Pension Funds

Funded social security programs are particularly vulnerable to economic and financial market shocks. As a consequence of the recent crisis, a large fraction of the Dutch pension funds had to submit restoration plans for the recovery of their buffers. Such plans will have to rely primarily on a mix of reduced benefit indexation and increased pension contributions. Hence, a discussion has emerged whether indexation should be differentiated across the various groups of participants in a pension fund. We investigate this issue numerically, developing an applied many-generation small open-economy OLG model with heterogeneous agents. The pension system consists of a first-pillar PAYG component and a second pillar with a pension fund. In our stochastic simulations, we hit the economy with a variety of unexpected demographic, economic and financial shocks. We compare uniform indexation of pension rights across all fund participants with alternatives such as status-contingent indexation in which pensions are protected against price inflation. While the aggregate welfare consequences are small, group-specific consequences are more substantial with the workers and future born losing and retirees benefitting from a shift away from uniform indexation. The exception is a scheme which links indexation directly to the fund’s asset performance. Under this scheme the retired benefit without other groups losing. The welfare effects are primarily the result of systematic welfare redistributions rather than of shifts in the benefits of risk sharing. Contribution rates always have to rise substantially from their initial levels to maintain the system’s sustainability. An increase in the retirement age that leaves existing pension rights untouched does little to avoid this rise with its adverse labour market consequences.     

The Politics of Skin Color in Brazil

Race in Brazil was constructed differently than race in the United States. This article traces the historical making of race in Brazil. I also examine recent notions of race and color that acknowledge that blacks and browns are distinctly different than whites when considering social and economic inequalities between the two. Current racial discourse in Brazil includes addressing illnesses such as anemia and diabetes as illnesses that disproportionately affect Afro–Brazilians. Such discourse was unimaginable 30 years ago. A similar racial discourse is present in American society, despite that the two have distinct racial histories. Such a discourse is potentially harmful as social meanings of race are applied to the medical field. By tracing Brazil’s history of race, this article sheds light on how race is made in a non north-American context as well as show how such constructions are dangerous at times and useful and pragmatic in other cases.     

The political economy of the United States policy in Southern Africa

Conclusion Former Secretary of State Kissinger’s policies towards and maneuvers in southern Africa must be examined within the context of America’s global strategy and imperialist objectives. As in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America, the United States aims at giving South Africa sufficient support so that she can play a policing role in southern Africa, if not in sub-Sahara Africa as a whole. This is what the Nixon-Kissinger Doctrine called for. It argued that the Western countries must now establish a decentralized, global system of defense. This article was originally published inRBPE, Spring 1977 (vol. 7, no. 3).     

Housing Loan Patterns Toward Minority Borrowers in Mississippi: Analysis of Some Micro Data Evidence of Redlining

We apply a cross-regional probit analysis to examine the existence or otherwise of the discriminatory practice of “redlining” in housing loan lending practices of banks in Mississippi. Data on loan denial rates across three Mississippi regions of Tri-County Metro-Jackson, Southern Mississippi Corridor, and the Northern district are studied to determine the pattern of bank lending activities regarding owner-occupied housing loan extensions to minority members of Mississippi's population. The purpose is to determine the degree to which the banks have or have not observed fair and equitable lending practices toward minority borrowers, relative to the members of the majority population. The results suggest that there is a consistently high denial rates against minorities. The results indicate strong evidence of redlining practices in housing loan decisions, which contribute to the growth of racial segregation in the state.

Urban renewal: The case of Buffalo,NY

Scholars of urbanism have long been critical of America’s post-World War II efforts at urban renewal. What is generally less well understood is the theoretical context out of which urban renewal policy arose. This analysis sets forth the key precepts of modernist thinking in city planning as the explanation for urban renewal’s policy miscalculations. Data for Buffalo document the case, with emphasis upon the exclusion of blacks in the redevelopment process. Following three decades of failure, 1950 to 1980, a neighborhoodbased renewal project is now showing promise in meeting the housing needs of inner-city black households.     

Exports and Productivity Growth: First Evidence from a Continuous Treatment Approach

A recent survey of 54 micro-econometric studies reveals that exporting firms are more productive than non-exporters. However, previous empirical studies show that exporting does not necessarily improve productivity. One possible reason for this result is that most previous studies are restricted to analysing the relationship between a firm’s export status and the growth of its labour productivity, using the firms’ export status as a binary treatment variable and comparing the performance of exporting and non-exporting firms. In this paper, we apply the newly developed generalised propensity score (GPS) methodology that allows for continuous treatment, that is, different levels of the firms’ export activities. Using the GPS method and a large panel data set for German manufacturing firms, we estimate the relationship between a firm’s export-sales ratio and its labour productivity growth rate. We find that there is a causal effect of firms’ export activities on labour productivity growth. However, exporting improves labour productivity growth only within a sub-interval of the range of firms’ export-sales ratios. JEL no.  F14, F23, L60     

Is there an Anglo-American corporate governance model?

This paper questions the existence of an Anglo-American model of corporate governance and capitalism. Significant differences between the UK and US models of corporate governance are identified. The UK is a principles orientated system based more on voluntary codes operated on a ‘comply or explain’ basis, whilst the US system is more rules based and litigious. The UK focuses more on ex ante protection of ‘outside’ shareholders, whilst the US focuses on ex post protection of share traders. Institutional investors are expected to play a more prominent and wide ranging role in corporate governance in the UK than the US, though the evidence on their voting behaviour and wider ‘engagement’ activity is not readily available. The explosion of private equity led leveraged buy-out activity in the mid 2000s challenges the efficiency of both models and could be a harbinger of a ‘new capitalism’; relying more on incentive compatible remuneration packages and less on public disclosure and market discipline. Alternatively, it could simply be driven by the tax advantages currently enjoyed by debt over equity, the special deferred capital gains (‘carried interest’) tax treatment enjoyed by private equity, low (long as well as short term) real interest rates (‘cheap money’), and rising equity prices.     

China and the Exports of Other Asian Countries

We analyze the impact of China’s growth on the exports of other Asian countries, distinguishing China’s demand for imports from its penetration of export markets. We account for the endogeneity of Chinese exports by applying instrumental variables in a gravity model with country-pair fixed-effects. We find that China’s crowding-out effect is felt mainly in markets for consumer goods and hence by less-developed Asian countries, not in markets for capital goods or by the more advanced Asian economies. Meanwhile, China has been sucking in imports from its Asian neighbors, but this effect is mainly felt in markets for capital goods. Hence, more and less developed Asian countries are being affected very differently by China’s rise. JEL no. E5, F4     

Global Imbalances: Is Germany the New China? A Skeptical View

In this paper we evaluate the current account patterns of China and Germany. We point out that China’s current account surplus as a share of global GDP in recent years resembles that of Germany’s. Yet, an important difference is that the Euro block’s current account inclusive of Germany has overall been balanced, whereas emerging Asia’s current account inclusive of China has mostly been characterized by sizable surpluses. We further find that both China and Germany’s current account surpluses seem to be accounted for by common factors. However we have reasons to doubt the long run viability of these current account trends in future decades. Demographic transitions in China and Germany are projected to reduce their surpluses, and this effect is stronger for Germany. We also discuss plausible reasons to doubt the extent to which the Euro block will move towards significant surplus in the coming years.