The Wealth of Mexican Americans

Deborah Cobb-Clark and Vincent Hildebrand

No 519, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Economics, Australian National University

Abstract: This paper analyzes the sources of disparities in the relative wealth position of Mexican Americans. Results reveal that - unlike the racial wealth gap - Mexican Americans' wealth disadvantage is in large part not the result of differences in wealth distributions conditional on the underlying determinants of wealth. Rather, Mexican Americans' wealth disadvantage is attributable to the fact that these families have more young children and heads who are younger. Mexican Americans' low educational attainment also has a direct effect in producing a wealth gap relative to other ethnic groups even after differences in income are taken into account. Income differentials are important, but do not play the primary role in explaining the gap in median net worth. Finally, geographic concentration is generally unimportant, but does contribute to narrowing the wealth gap between wealthy Mexican Americans and their white and black counterparts.

JEL-codes: G11 J10 J61 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 50 pages
Date: 2006-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-fin
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (55)

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Related works:
Journal Article: The Wealth of Mexican Americans (2006)
Working Paper: The Wealth of Mexican Americans (2004)
Working Paper: The Wealth of Mexican Americans (2004)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:auu:dpaper:519

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