Healthy US economy failed to narrow racial gaps in 2019
The Wall Street street sign is framed by a giant American flag hanging on the New York Stock Exchange, in a Monday, Sept. 21, 2020 file photo. Stocks are opening higher on Wall Street, recovering after their first four-week losing streak in more than a year. A burst of corporate deals helped give investors confidence to put money back in the market, and the S&P 500 rose 1.4% in the early going Monday, Sept. 28, 2020.[AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, File]
The solid growth that the United States enjoyed before the viral pandemic paralyzed the economy this spring failed to reduce racial disparities in Americans’ income and wealth from 2016 through 2019, the Federal Reserve said Monday.
Though Black and Hispanic households reported sharper gains in wealth than white households did, those increases weren’t enough to much narrow the racial gaps. The typical white family possessed eight times the wealth of Black families and five times the wealth of Hispanic families, the Fed said.
The Fed’s Survey of Consumer Finances, released every three years, analyzed incomes and wealth for the three years ended in 2019. The survey found that income for the typical U.S. family rose 5%, adjusted for inflation, from 2016 to 2019 to $58,600. That was weaker than the 9% income gain the typical family received from 2013 through 2016.