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Black women make median wealth of $5/year

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Black Wolf

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The almighty social scientists declared that black women, on average, make $5 a year.
They were talking about wealth, not income. Imagine, for instance, that for every dollar of assets held by a "single black woman" that same woman or some other "singe black woman" had a dollar of debt, then the net assets of the group would be zero. (Not that I know anything about this study to know if it is right or wrong; but, the statistic is at least more plausible than if they'd spoken about income.)
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Well, it definitely doesn't seem like they were trying to talk about "wealth", in the sense of equity. In the very same article, they talk about how "White" women make $48,000/year on average.

I can't access the full article but it seems possible they are switching between income and equity to confuse the terms. Since income can't be negative, it would not be possible to have a yearly income at that level in the US. Perhaps they are adding in europe and africa.

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It is a meaningless statistic. Since most recipients of preferential treatment while receiving loans from banks are treated preferentially specifically because the government is indirectly subsidizing the loans (meaning they are never expected to pay them back, the government does that for them), and single black women are already considered a disadvantaged group by the government and given preferential treatment, their debt is not really real debt. It's only on paper, if at all (I'm sure most bankers just look at it as form of taxation). So, their median wealth is the sum of whatever those single black women who would be considered rich by the government have minus their debt, and what those who are considered poor have, without their debt subtracted (since they won't be paying it back, thus not making their net worth a negative sum, or any less than what they do actually have access to (house, car, or even just a welfare check for $200 they haven't spent yet), divided by the total number of black women. That's obviously not $5.

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  • 10 months later...

This was about the US only. The full study report is here. It is really a lousy, politically-slanted, racist report which does not answer the moist basic questions someone might have. for me, the first question that comes to mind is: what does the median obscure. For instance, they say that 46% of single-black women have zero to negative wealth (i.e. they owe more than they own). The obvious next step would be to break this group down by certain factors (e.g. education, type of job, marital history and so on). Note that the zero net wealth figure for single-Hispanic women was almost identical (45%). So, it would make sense to break this group down by the same factors (e.g. education, type of job, etc.). This might show what factors are highly correlated. For instance, we might find that single women who have a high school degree or less and who have children are poor. Shocking!

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Okay, so the statistics are being measured only in the US.

My question is, on page 6 of the report, the discrepancy of wealth between single white woman and black woman is so large - 41,500 and 100. If the measurement is based on a set of correlated factors and the figure of black woman wealth is biased, why there is such a difference between the two numbers?

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If the measurement is based on a set of correlated factors and the figure of black woman wealth is biased, why there is such a difference between the two numbers?
A good study would answer that question. As far as I can tell, the figures are for White women and Black women, not "White women adjusted for other differences". Therefore, the figures don't provide a good break down, other than the one the researchers chose: i.e. race. We know that race -- in the U.S. -- is correlated with other factors, which are likely to affect income levels. For example, according to the Census Bureau, females with a high-school and equivalent qualification earned about $22K per year, while those with a bachelor's degree earned about $40K a year. Next, we'd need to know if the black and hispanic women in the survey had significantly lower educational qualifications than the white women. Similarly, being a single mother is very difficult, and coupled with lower education is almost a guarantee of poverty. Therefore, we'd have to ask if the black and hispanic women in the survey had a significantly higher incidence of being single mothers, and if the single mothers among them had significantly more young children when compared to the single white women.
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If the measurement is based on a set of correlated factors and the figure of black woman wealth is biased, why there is such a difference between the two numbers?
A good study would answer that question. As far as I can tell, the figures are for White women and Black women, not "White women adjusted for other differences". Therefore, the figures don't provide a good break down, other than the one the researchers chose: i.e. race. We know that race -- in the U.S. -- is correlated with other factors, which are likely to affect income levels. For example, according to the Census Bureau, females with a high-school and equivalent qualification earned about $22K per year, while those with a bachelor's degree earned about $40K a year. Next, we'd need to know if the black and hispanic women in the survey had significantly lower educational qualifications than the white women. Similarly, being a single mother is very difficult, and coupled with lower education is almost a guarantee of poverty. Therefore, we'd have to ask if the black and hispanic women in the survey had a significantly higher incidence of being single mothers, and if the single mothers among them had significantly more young children when compared to the single white women.
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We know that race -- in the U.S. -- is correlated with other factors, which are likely to affect income levels.

Thank you for clearing my doubt. That sounds more logical to me now. It would be better for the author to pinpoint that factors such as education level and number of children need to be taken care of contributes to the income level of a woman, as opposed to just race. Is it justifiable to conclude that black women have a low income because in general, they receive lower education and perhaps having more children, if relevant surveys are carried out?

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