Race, Class, and Financial Geography: Neighborhood Access to and Use of Financial Institutions

• In Event: Community and Urban Sociology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 17: Urban Markets

Abstract

One of the most potentially consequential aspects of neighborhood inequality is access to financial institutions. Conventional banks play a role in many aspects of economic wellbeing and mobility, including home ownership, college education, and credit. Conversely, alternative financial institutions have been implicated in long term debt and persistent poverty. But while research on “neighborhood disadvantage” has often found disparities, studies remain unclear on whether race or class matters more. Furthermore, while researchers have shown that neighborhoods differ in access to financial institutions, less well understood is whether differences in access translate into differences in usage. This paper examines both dimensions of financial access, conventional and alternative, with an eye to whether race or class matters more and whether access translates to usage.

Authors

• Mario Luis Small, Columbia University

• Taylor Alarcon, Columbia University

• Hannah Pullen-Blasnik, Columbia University