Different people have disparate experiences in accessing credits. Exploring ways to close this credit access gap could provide more economic opportunities for underprivileged areas.

Monetary policy, marriage, college admissions, and discrimination and socioeconomic outcomes were among the topics discussed at our recent conference.

Urvi Neelakantan and Kristen Broady review their research on differences in wealth between races and potential causes behind these differences. They also discuss potential solutions to closing wealth gaps. Neelakantan is a senior policy economist at the Richmond Fed and Broady is a senior economist, economic advisor, and director of the Economic Mobility Project at the Chicago Fed.

An estimated 30 percent of Fifth District businesses are minority-owned, but this trails the minority share of the population.

Richmond Fed economists are using novel approaches to understand racial wealth differences

Richmond Fed president Tom Barkin discusses racial inequality in the Fifth District and how the Richmond Fed is working to make a positive difference.

Student loan debt is a growing burden for many residents of the District of Columbia, especially for lower-income borrowers.

This report explores differences in community growth and income by analyzing indicators of access and health in the credit economy from 2007-2017.

The path to home ownership has been especially difficult for Black Americans. This issue of 5th District Footprint explores these gaps as of 2016.

This post explores lagged recovery in labor force participation for Black and Hispanic women that started at the onset of the COVID-19 recession.

President Tom Barkin shares what he learned from conversations with educators and policymakers about the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on students.

Senior policy economist Arantxa Jarque discusses the importance of having diverse voices represented at the Federal Reserve and in the economics profession in general.

Research finds that first-time incarceration can decrease men's lifetime earnings as well as increase the number of years spent unemployed or out of the labor force.

Tiffany Hollin-Wright and Erika Bell explain "benefits cliffs" ― when workers receiving public assistance earn a raise and then are disqualified from receiving government help.

This publication contains summaries of the research presented at a virtual seminar in June 2020. The papers highlighted insights from search and matching, networks, and employer learning.

Community colleges serve a larger share of minority students than public or private four-year schools.

Why do kids drop out of high school, and what can be done to help them finish?

Minorities are less likely to climb the economic ladder than whites. Access to high-quality early childhood education plays an important role.

Ray Owens and Santiago Pinto discuss current trends in crime rates, the challenges of determining the extent of crime and its causes, and the impact of policing on crime rates. They also review research on racial bias in policing and the impact of police violence against Black citizens. Owens and Pinto are senior economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.

Heirs' property, land passed through generations without a clear title, is an unstable form of landownership that can lead to lost capital and wealth.

This episode shares part of a 2019 presentation by Laura Ullrich about wage, income and wealth inequality, an issue that was brought into focus during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rural black Fifth District communities have long suffered fewer economic opportunities and thus worse economic outcomes.

This article provides some history on the evolution of the Fifth District population across race and the rural-urban continuum since the late 1800s.

Although the Fifth District’s black population tends to have higher employment and educational attainment compared to the nation’s, there are still significant disparities relative to whites.

A new financing model for distressed communities offers both promise and pitfalls.

This issue of Community Scope focuses on the history of housing policy in Baltimore, including practices that separated residents by race, ethnicity and religion.

This issue of 5th District Footprint observes how racial segregation has changed in District countries from 1980 to 2016.