Urban Institute: Race/Ethnicity/Gender
Urban Institute reports on: Race/Ethnicity/Gender - The Urban Institute is a nonprofit nonpartisan policy research and educational organization established to examine the social, economic, and governance problems facing the nation.

• Immigrant Integration in Low-income Urban Neighborhoods : Improving Economic Prospects and Strengthening Connections for Vulnerable Families
  The paper explores the financial well-being and economic integration of immigrant groups compared with native-born minorities and whites in vulnerable urban neighborhoods. Among the main findings from the analysis is that immigrants and native minorities in the neighborhoods we examine face similar types of economic difficulties. However, after controlling for citizenship, English proficiency, educational attainment, and having a drivers license and a reliable car, many of the economic disadvantages disappear for immigrant groups, but not for native-born minorities. These findings suggest that even in tough neighborhoods, the potential for economic integration of immigrants is strong.
• Are Children Accessing and Using Needed Mental Health Care Services?
  This brief presents data on mental health coverage benefits and enrollees' access to and use of mental health services through the Healthy Kids program in San Mateo County, California. The prevalence of mental health conditions among enrollees is similar to national levels, but despite the generous mental health benefits offered under the program, only a small fraction of enrollees with mental health conditions receive care. Reasons why more children do not use mental health services are explored. The brief also shows that enrollees with mental health needs have higher use of other health services compared to all Healthy Kids members.
• Racial Disparities and the New Federalism
  The paper explores how shifts in both social welfare policies and economic conditions beginning in the mid-1990s altered the relative well-being of blacks compared to whitesbetween 1997 and 2002. It uses the National Survey of America's Families (NSAF) to assess how the relative well-being of black families improved or disparities persisted. The findings suggest that some of the disparities between whites and blacks narrowed between 1997 and 2002, especially among people with low incomes. But gaps in income, child school outcomes, employment, assets, and welfare and other income supports, remained essentially unchanged over the period.
• The Labor Market and Young Black Men: Updating Moynihan's Perspective
  In this paper I review Daniel Patrick Moynihan's views on employment and young black men in his 1965 report. I then update the evidence on their employment status, and review the causes and policy implications of these trends. Moynihan was extremely prescient in forecasting a "crisis...that would only grow worse." He understood that these trends involve both limits on labor market opportunities that these young men face as well as skill deficits and behavioral responses by the young men themselves. Policies that deal with a wide range of disadvantages and behaviors are needed to reverse these trends.
• Busting the Myth that Poor, Urban Schools Can't Succeed
  With the first bell of the new school year about to ring, a new book from the Urban Institute Press spotlights how urban schools serving low-income minority students can shine.
• Access, Use, and Costs of Dental Services in the Healthy Kids Program
  This brief presents data on dental coverage benefits and enrollee's access and use of dental services through the Healthy Kids program in San Mateo County, California, which offers subsidized health and dental insurance for children living below 400 percent of federal poverty who are ineligible for Medi-Cal and Healthy Families (California's SCHIP program). Healthy Kids dental coverage has led to use of dental services among a sizable portion of enrollees. Children seeking dental services were more costly for the program than other enrollees, and dental care costs accounted for a large proportion of the overall cost of their healthcare. While there is adequate service capacity to meet childrens dental needs in the county, renewed efforts to link enrollees with dental care are needed.
• Now To Really Tackle Discrimination : The Government We Deserve
  Louisville is back in the news these days because its plan for integrating schools, like Seattle's, was overturned recently by the Supreme Court. However divided is opinion over this decision, it should force us to look more deeply into what a well-integrated society means and requires. Public debate should range far beyond the use of race as a factor in determining which kids can go to which schools.
• Adoption and Foster Care by Lesbian and Gay Parents in the United States
  Discussion and debate about adoption and foster care by gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) parents occurs frequently among policymakers, social service agencies, and social workers. Three states currently restrict GLB people from adopting and more are considering similar policies. This report provides new information on GLB adoption and foster care from several government data sources. It offers a demographic portrait of the estimated 65,500 adopted children and 14,100 foster children living with gay and lesbian parents. It also assesses the costs to child welfare systems of proposed bans on allowing GLB people to foster.
• Social Security Spouse and Survivor Benefits for the Modern Family
  Social Security spouse and survivor benefits advantage single-earner families relative to dual-earner families paying the same total taxes. Our paper considers earnings sharingthrough which husbands' and wives' earnings records are combined and averaged throughout their marriage when computing benefitsas well as other changes to spouse/survivor benefits, including caregiver credits and minimum benefits. All the roughly cost-equivalent packages examined improve adequacy and horizontal equity compared to current law. The earnings-sharing proposal, however, only reduced poverty with significant adjustments to the treatment of surviving spouses. The packages reveal tradeoffs among beneficiary groups, with particular tensions around work and marital status.
• Subprime Mortgage Lending in Washington, DC : Testimony Before the D.C. Council, Committee on Public Services and Consumer Affairs
  As is true nationally, many home buyers in the District of Columbia have made use of subprime loans to purchase a home. Data indicate that use of subprime loans is highest in Wards 4, 5, 7, and 8, and among African-American and Latino borrowers. High use of subprime loans by these groups point to areas where predatory or illegal practices might be occurring. The D.C. Council can consider several measures to address these concerns, including providing better education and credit counseling for homebuyers, requiring more reporting by mortgage lenders, and testing mortgage lenders for fair housing practices.
• Gender Gaps in Math and Reading Gains During Elementary and High School by Race and Ethnicity
  Gender differences in academic achievement have long fascinated researchers and policy-makers alike. In this paper we analyze differences in math and reading test score growth rates by gender for four different race and ethnic groups -- white, black, Hispanic, and Asian students -- for six different time periods. Our data cover both the earliest years of education and the crucial years of adolescence. In addition, we have data bracketing one non-schooling period. Together these data enable us to get a very complete picture of how gender gaps evolve over the course of early elementary and high school years and how these trajectories differ by race and ethnicity. While the gender gaps are not always statistically significant, they are for 15 of 48 comparisons made, all during school. In addition, all of the statistically significant results suggest that males learn more math and females more reading during early elementary school and again during high school.
• Affordable Housing in Healthy Neighborhoods: Critical Policy Challenges Facing the Greater New Orleans Region : Statement Before the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services
  New Orleans urgently needs to rebuild affordable rental housing in order to recover fully and fairly. However, neither low-income families nor the communities in which they live will be well served if affordable housing is rebuilt according to the patterns of the past. Models are emerging in other cities that integrate affordable housing into healthy, mixed-income neighborhoods. New Orleans can also look to experience from other cities for examples of how to rebuild low-income communities in ways that are respectful of the original residents but do not concentrate and isolate them yet again. Alt