The Prevalence of Hardship by Race and Ethnicity in the USA, 1992–2019

John Iceland () and Arthur Sakamoto
Additional contact information
John Iceland: Penn State University
Arthur Sakamoto: Texas A&M University

Population Research and Policy Review, 2022, vol. 41, issue 5, No 7, 2036 pages

Abstract: Abstract Racial and ethnic inequality continues to be the subject of considerable public interest. We shed light on this issue by examining racial disparities in the prevalence of several types of hardship, such as trouble paying bills and housing problems, in the USA over the 1992–2019 period. Using data from several panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation, we find that hardships were considerably higher—sometimes double, depending on the measure—among blacks and Hispanics than whites and Asians. Nevertheless, these disparities generally narrowed over time. We find that the decline in these disparities—as indicated by a summary hardship index—exceeded that of the official income poverty ratio. We also find that while Asians were more likely to be poor than whites, they were not more likely to experience hardship. Notably, we also see variation in the experiences of different types of hardship. Specifically, there was little decline in the racial disparity of two of the hardships that tend to be responsive to short-term fluctuations in income—bill-paying and health hardship, as well as fear of crime—but substantial declines in disparities with most other measures. Overall, our findings indicate significant racial differences in the experience of hardship, though with a narrowing of many gaps over time.

Keywords: Racial inequality; Hardship; Race and ethnicity; Poverty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11113-022-09733-3 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:poprpr:v:41:y:2022:i:5:d:10.1007_s11113-022-09733-3

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... es/journal/11113/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s11113-022-09733-3

Access Statistics for this article

Population Research and Policy Review is currently edited by D.A. Swanson

More articles in Population Research and Policy Review from Springer, Southern Demographic Association (SDA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().