The Impact of Federal Housing Policies on Racial Inequality

该奖项是作为NSF社会、行为和经济学博士后研究奖学金(SPRF)计划的一部分提供的。SPRF计划的目标是为学术界、工业界或私营部门和政府的科学职业生涯培养有前途的、早期职业博士水平的科学家。SPRF奖项包括在知名科学家的赞助下进行两年的培训，并鼓励博士后研究员进行独立研究。国家科学基金会致力于促进科学界所有阶层的科学家参与其研究方案和活动，包括那些来自代表性不足的群体的科学家；博士后阶段被认为是实现这一目标的专业发展的一个重要水平。每个博士后研究员都必须解决推动各自学科领域向前发展的重要科学问题。由小威廉·达里姆博士赞助。在杜克大学，这项博士后奖学金支持一位研究联邦住房政策对种族不平等影响的早期职业科学家。这一研究项目的目的是通过审查歧视性住房政策所起的作用，促进我们对种族不平等的根本原因的理解。研究新政住房政策对黑人和白人的影响，将检验一种说法，即将当今住房拥有率和财富方面的种族差异归因于有利于白人家庭的联邦计划。这项研究的结果有可能改变我们对种族不平等的起源和持久存在的理解；这一现象通过影响政治话语、政府政策和个人对公共政策的看法而影响所有美国人，包括刑事司法、税收、社会项目和公立学校财务。为了解释黑人劣势的普遍存在，一种新的叙事指出，联邦政府的新政住房计划是通过阻止黑人拥有住房和促进住宅隔离来加剧和凝聚种族差距的罪魁祸首。这个项目的目标是通过将数据应用于其假设来审问这一叙述。这项研究计划涉及使用1930和1940十年一次的人口普查的完整统计数据，以估计联邦住房管理局(FHA)的抵押贷款担保计划对黑人和白人的住房拥有率、住房价值和社会经济地位的短期影响。第二个目标涉及使用1950年开始的人口普查数据样本来估计联邦住房管理局抵押贷款计划对这些相同结果的长期影响。一个新的工具变量策略将被用来在这个问题上获得因果关系，因为获得更高水平的FHA贷款的县也可能因为无关的原因而表现出更大的种族差异。从国家档案馆收集的原始数据将阐明FHA抵押贷款在个人地址层面的地理分布，并提供FHA抵押贷款接受者的描述性说明。从1950年住房普查收集的数据将把我们可以衡量项目活动的持续时间延长十年。该项目寻求对一个重要的联邦项目进行第一次全面的实证评估，该项目可能塑造了美国城市地区的种族地理。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award was provided as part of NSF's Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowships (SPRF) program. The goal of the SPRF program is to prepare promising, early career doctoral-level scientists for scientific careers in academia, industry or private sector, and government. SPRF awards involve two years of training under the sponsorship of established scientists and encourage Postdoctoral Fellows to perform independent research. NSF seeks to promote the participation of scientists from all segments of the scientific community, including those from underrepresented groups, in its research programs and activities; the postdoctoral period is considered to be an important level of professional development in attaining this goal. Each Postdoctoral Fellow must address important scientific questions that advance their respective disciplinary fields. Under the sponsorship of Dr. William Darity, Jr. at Duke University, this postdoctoral fellowship award supports an early career scientist investigating the impact of federal housing policies on racial inequality. The goal of this research project is to advance our understanding of the root causes of racial inequality by examining the role played by discriminatory housing policies. Studying the impact of New Deal housing policies on blacks and whites will test a narrative attributing present-day racial disparities in home-ownership and wealth to federal programs that favored white households. The findings of this study have the potential to shape our understanding of the origins and persistence of racial inequality; a phenomenon that affects all Americans through its impact on political discourse, government policy, and individuals' views about public policies, including criminal justice, taxation, social programs and public school finance.To explain the ubiquity of black disadvantage, an emerging narrative points to the federal government's New Deal housing programs as culprits in exacerbating and congealing racial disparities by discouraging black home-ownership and promoting residential segregation. The objective of this project is to interrogate this narrative by bringing data to bear on its hypotheses. The research plan involves using full count census data from the 1930 and 1940 decennial censuses to estimate the short-term impact of the Federal Housing Administration's (FHA) mortgage guarantee program on black and white home-ownership, home values, and socioeconomic standing. A second objective involves using census data samples starting in 1950 to estimate the long-term impact of the FHA's mortgage program on these same outcomes. A novel instrumental variables strategy will be used to gain causal leverage on this question, as counties that receive higher levels of FHA lending may also exhibit elevated racial disparities for unrelated reasons. Original data collection from the National Archives will shed light on the geographic distribution of FHA mortgages at the level of individual addresses and present a descriptive account of FHA mortgage recipients. Data collection from the 1950 census of housing will extend the duration of time for which we can measure program activity by a decade. The project seeks to produce the first comprehensive empirical evaluation of an important federal program that has likely shaped the racial geography of urban areas across the US.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.