Racial Gap

While the average U.S. household spends 3.2 percent of their income on utility bills, Black households spend an average of 5.1 percent of their income on energy expenses. This disparity holds true even when comparing households in majority-White and majority-Black neighborhoods with similar income levels.

Even among schools' top performing students, Black students are significantly less likely than their Asian, White, and Latino peers to take algebra in eighth grade. This leads to unequal access to advanced math courses in high school, putting Black students at a disadvantage when applying to college.

Compared to White Americans, Black Americans are less likely to trust the information provided by medical professionals and scientific literature regarding genetic medicine, which could be contributing to their underrepresentation in genetic research.

A team of scholars from Brown University and Harvard University has found premature deaths—those occurring before age 65—have steadily increased in the United States in recent years, particularly among Black Americans.

In 1984, the Victims of Crime Act established victim compensation programs to support victims and families of violent crime. Although Black families are more likely to file victim compensation claims, they are less likely to have their claims approved than White families.

Many Ivy League institutions, major research universities, and highly-selective liberal arts colleges across the United States have experienced sharp declines in Black first-year student enrollments since the Supreme Court's 2023 decision to end affirmative action.

According to a new study from scholars at the University of Illinois, highly-visible public universities in states that have adopted performance-based funding policies have experienced declines in their Black undergraduate enrollment.

According to a new economics study, second-generation Black immigrant women have achieved earnings that are higher than or equal to White American women in recent years. Second-generation Black men achieved similar progress, particularly among workers at the top 10 percent of income distribution.

Between 2011-2012 and 2021-2022, federal funding for the Pell Grant program decreased by some $10 billion. Over the same time period, there was a decrease of more than 487,000 Black students at U.S. colleges and universities, with the steepest declines occurring in southern states.

According to a new report from the National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistants, Black PAs are less than four percent of all PAs working in primary care. Only three out of the top 25 PA specialties have a PA workforce that is at least 5 percent Black.

According to the authors, California has two racially identifiable advantaged groups, White and Asian students, who are less likely to be enrolled in schools of concentrated poverty than their Black, Latinx, and American Indian peers.

Even when they report feeling supported at school, Black boys from low-income communities still report higher levels of depression than their peers, according to a new study from Adrian Gale of Rutgers University.

According to a nationally representative analysis of women experiencing infertility between 2013 and 2020, there are major racial disparities in birth outcomes following treatment, with just 3 percent of Black women experiencing a successful live birth after receiving fertility treatment, compared to 17 percent of Asian women and 13 percent of White women.

In 2022 poverty rate rate was the lowest on record for Black Americans at 17.1 percent. In 2023, the poverty rate for African Americans rose to 17.9 percent. In 2024, 18.4 percent of Black Americans were poor.

“My mathematical findings show that even if we hypothetically lived in a seemingly utopian world where everyone was starting off on equal footing and there were colorblind policies, minorities would still face disadvantages in social and economic opportunities over time because of social network dynamics arising from their group size being smaller,” said Chika Okafor of Northwestern University.

In 2024, the median Black household income was 60.5 percent of the median income of non-Hispanic White families. In 2023, the income gap was 63.4 percent. In 2022, the figure was 65.2 percent.

Nearly 30 percent of all Black Americans over age 25 held at least a bachelor's degree in 2024, compared to over 38 percent of White American adults. The gap in graduate degree attainment is much smaller, with 9 percent of Black adults and 11 percent of White adults holding a master's degree as their highest level of education.

According to a new study, school finance reforms that were designed to close spending gaps between high and low-income school districts increased spending disparities between districts with low and high percentages of Black and Hispanic students.

Compared to the mean of medical school matriculants from 2019 to 2023, there was a significant decline in the share of matriculants from racial backgrounds underrepresented in medicine compared to their White and Asian peers. Notably, declines were most pronounced at institutions located in states without prior state-level affirmative action bans.

Today, 64 percent of all U.S. adults think racism against Black Americans is widespread. Black adults are the most likely racial group to agree, with 83 percent holding this sentiment. In comparison, 64 percent of Hispanic adults and 61 percent of White adults say the same.