IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/joerap/v6y2023i2d10.1007_s41996-022-00109-5.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Housing Instability During the COVID-19 Pandemic: the Role of Assets and Income Shocks

Author

Listed:
  • Yung Chun

    (Social Policy Institute, Washington University in St. Louis
    Washington University in St. Louis)

  • Stephen Roll

    (Social Policy Institute, Washington University in St. Louis
    Washington University in St. Louis)

  • Selina Miller

    (Washington University in St. Louis)

  • Hedwig Lee

    (Social Policy Institute, Washington University in St. Louis
    Washington University in St. Louis)

  • Savannah Larimore

    (Washington University in St. Louis)

  • Michal Grinstein-Weiss

    (Social Policy Institute, Washington University in St. Louis
    Washington University in St. Louis)

Abstract

Stable and adequate housing is critical to sound public health responses in the midst of a pandemic. This study explores the disproportionate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on housing-related hardships across racial/ethnic groups in the USA as well as the extent to which these disparities are mediated by households’ broader economic circumstances, which we operationalized in terms of prepandemic liquid assets and pandemic-related income losses. Using a longitudinal national survey with more than 23,000 responses, we found that Black and Hispanic respondents were more vulnerable to housing-related hardships during the pandemic than white respondents. These impacts were particularly pronounced in low- and moderate-income households. We found that liquid assets acted as a strong mediator of the housing hardship disparities between white and Black/Hispanic households. Our findings imply that housing became less stable for minority groups as a result of the pandemic, particularly those households with limited liquid assets. Such housing-related disparities demonstrate the need for policies and practices that target support to economically marginalized groups and families of color in particular.

Suggested Citation

  • Yung Chun & Stephen Roll & Selina Miller & Hedwig Lee & Savannah Larimore & Michal Grinstein-Weiss, 2023. "Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Housing Instability During the COVID-19 Pandemic: the Role of Assets and Income Shocks," Journal of Economics, Race, and Policy, Springer, vol. 6(2), pages 63-81, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:joerap:v:6:y:2023:i:2:d:10.1007_s41996-022-00109-5
    DOI: 10.1007/s41996-022-00109-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s41996-022-00109-5
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s41996-022-00109-5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Couch, Kenneth A. & Fairlie, Robert W. & Xu, Huanan, 2020. "The Impacts of COVID-19 on Minority Unemployment: First Evidence from April 2020 CPS Microdata," IZA Discussion Papers 13264, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Kay Jowers & Christopher Timmins & Nrupen Bhavsar & Qihui Hu & Julia Marshall, 2021. "Housing Precarity & the COVID-19 Pandemic: Impacts of Utility Disconnection and Eviction Moratoria on Infections and Deaths Across US Counties," NBER Working Papers 28394, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Richard B. Freeman, 1973. "Changes in the Labor Market for Black Americans, 1948-72," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 4(1), pages 67-132.
    4. Elora Raymond & Kyungsoon Wang & Dan Immergluck, 2016. "Race and uneven recovery: neighborhood home value trajectories in Atlanta before and after the housing crisis," Housing Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(3), pages 324-339, April.
    5. Lauren M. Ross & Gregory D. Squires, 2011. "The Personal Costs of Subprime Lending and the Foreclosure Crisis: A Matter of Trust, Insecurity, and Institutional Deception," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 92(1), pages 140-163, March.
    6. Cynthia Brown & Jose Pagan, 1998. "Changes in employment status across demographic groups during the 1990-1991 recession," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(12), pages 1571-1583.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Caroline Hopkins & Alexandra Marr & November Wilson, 2024. "How Does Mortgage Performance Vary Across Borrower Demographics Following a Hurricane?," FHFA Staff Working Papers 24-09, Federal Housing Finance Agency.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Couch, Kenneth A. & Fairlie, Robert W. & Xu, Huanan, 2020. "Early evidence of the impacts of COVID-19 on minority unemployment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    2. Kenneth A. Couch & Robert W. Fairlie & Huanan Xu, 2023. "Racial disparities in unemployment during the COVID‐19 pandemic and recovery: The “stubborn,” the “hiccup,” and the “stall”," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 61(3), pages 480-495, July.
    3. Armagan Gezici & Ozge Ozay, 2020. "An Intersectional Analysis of COVID-19 Unemployment," Journal of Economics, Race, and Policy, Springer, vol. 3(4), pages 270-281, December.
    4. Illing, Hannah & Koch, Theresa, 2021. "Who Suffers the Greatest Loss? Costs of Job Displacement for Migrants and Natives," IAB-Discussion Paper 202108, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    5. Don Mar & Paul Ong & Tom Larson & James Peoples, 2022. "Racial and ethnic disparities in who receives unemployment benefits during COVID-19," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 2(8), pages 1-17, August.
    6. Louis-Philippe Beland & Abel Brodeur & Taylor Wright, 2020. "COVID-19, Stay-at-Home Orders and Employment: Evidence from CPS Data," Carleton Economic Papers 20-04, Carleton University, Department of Economics, revised 19 May 2020.
    7. Nicholas W. Papageorge & Matthew V. Zahn & Michèle Belot & Eline Broek-Altenburg & Syngjoo Choi & Julian C. Jamison & Egon Tripodi, 2021. "Socio-demographic factors associated with self-protecting behavior during the Covid-19 pandemic," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 34(2), pages 691-738, April.
    8. Brandily, Paul & Brébion, Clément & Briole, Simon & Khoury, Laura, 2021. "A poorly understood disease? The impact of COVID-19 on the income gradient in mortality over the course of the pandemic," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    9. Julie L. Hotchkiss & Robert E. Moore, 2022. "Some Like it Hot: Assessing Longer-Term Labor Market Benefits from a High-Pressure Economy," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 18(2), pages 193-243, June.
    10. Vásquez-Vera, Hugo & Palència, Laia & Magna, Ingrid & Mena, Carlos & Neira, Jaime & Borrell, Carme, 2017. "The threat of home eviction and its effects on health through the equity lens: A systematic review," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 199-208.
    11. Sami Miaari & Asaf Zussman & Noam Zussman, 2012. "Ethnic conflict and job separations," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 25(2), pages 419-437, January.
    12. Heckman, James J & Payner, Brook S, 1989. "Determining the Impact of Federal Antidiscrimination Policy on the Economic Status of Blacks: A Study of South Carolina," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(1), pages 138-177, March.
    13. Michele Belot & Syngjoo Choi & Egon Tripodi & Eline van den Broek-Altenburg & Julian C. Jamison & Nicholas W. Papageorge, 2020. "Unequal Consequences of Covid 19 across Age and Income: Representative Evidence from Six Countries," Working Paper Series no135, Institute of Economic Research, Seoul National University.
    14. Bertocchi, Graziella & Dimico, Arcangelo, 2020. "COVID-19, Race, and Redlining," GLO Discussion Paper Series 603, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    15. Vanda Almeida & Salvador Barrios & Michael Christl & Silvia Poli & Alberto Tumino & Wouter Wielen, 2021. "The impact of COVID-19 on households´ income in the EU," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 19(3), pages 413-431, September.
    16. Leishman, Chris & Aminpour, Fatemeh & Baker, Emma & Beer, Andrew & Crowe, Adam & Goodall, Zoë & Horton, Ella & Jacobs, Keith & Lester, Laurence & Maclennan, Duncan, 2022. "Australia’s COVID-19 pandemic housing policy responses," SocArXiv yef47, Center for Open Science.
    17. Dang, Hai-Anh H. & Trinh, Trong-Anh, 2020. "Does the COVID-19 Pandemic Improve Global Air Quality? New Cross-national Evidence on Its Unintended Consequences," GLO Discussion Paper Series 606, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    18. Abel Brodeur & David Gray & Anik Islam & Suraiya Bhuiyan, 2021. "A literature review of the economics of COVID‐19," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(4), pages 1007-1044, September.
    19. Donald Freeman, 2012. "On (Not) Closing the Gaps: The Evolution of National and Regional Unemployment Rates by Race and Ethnicity," The Review of Black Political Economy, Springer;National Economic Association, vol. 39(2), pages 267-284, June.
    20. Lex Borghans & Bas Ter Weel & Bruce A. Weinberg, 2014. "People Skills and the Labor-Market Outcomes of Underrepresented Groups," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 67(2), pages 287-334, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:joerap:v:6:y:2023:i:2:d:10.1007_s41996-022-00109-5. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.