One way that extreme inequality shows up in our lives is unequal opportunity in homeownership.
And for millennials, these inequalities are compounded by the absence of publicly-supported mortgage programs, such as those that helped white boomers buy their homes after World War Two.
Both of us – Jessicah Pierre and Chuck Collins from the Program on Inequality at the Institute for Policy Studies – were interviewed for an article in the “Style Section” of the The New York Times, “Fly on My Own? Get Real.” Read what we had to say below:
Without government-subsidized mortgage programs that launched millions of white households into homeownership, family wealth plays an oversized role in determining who can buy. And if that’s the case, it reinforces the existing economic and racial wealth divides.
“While it’s true that families with means have always helped their children (discreetly or not), what’s different today is that as the economy has more extreme gyrations and wages flatten, family wealth plays an outsize role in helping people get ahead, said Chuck Collins, a scion of the Oscar Mayer food corporation and the author of “Born on Third Base: A One Percenter Makes the Case for Tackling Inequality, Bringing Wealth Home, and Committing to the Common Good.”
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