Structural Inequalities Based on Race/Ethnicity and Income are Increasing During the Pandemic: Results From the RAPID-EC National Survey

• In Event: Household Functioning and Child Wellbeing in the Midst of COVID-19: Evidence from Across the United States

Abstract

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to unfold across the U.S., households with young children are experiencing very challenging circumstances. RAPID-EC (Rapid Assessment of Pandemic Impact on Development-Early Childhood) is an ongoing survey of families with children age 5 and under. The primary goal is to provide actionable data to key stakeholders (policy makers, practitioners, child advocates, researchers) to (a) inform immediate and long-term policy decisions and (b) facilitate design of support programs for families. RAPID-EC includes questions about family supports and utilization of resources, caregiver mental health and well-being, and child development including parents’ concerns about their child(ren)’s development.

RAPID-EC launched April 6, 2020 and fielded a weekly nationally representative survey (in terms of race/ethnicity, geography, and income) of over 1000 households through early August. From August through December 2020, we continue to field every other week. We analyze data and post findings to disseminate to key policy leaders, advocacy groups, organizations supporting caregivers and families, and the general public. Our partners are also using RAPID-EC data in additional analyses and in policy briefs regarding children and families impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In this presentation, we describe the results of analyses showing that structural inequalities based on race/ethnicity and income, which existed before the pandemic, have increased for households with young children in the ensuing months. In particular, we examine reports of material hardship (i.e., difficulty paying for basic needs such as food, housing, and utilities) in our longitudinal data. Our results show that by July of 2020, over 20% of our sample reported experiencing material hardship, and by mid-August with the end of the CARES act (which provided financial relief and a moratorium on housing evictions), this number had risen to over 40%. In this context, lower income households reported losing a significantly greater proportion of income, having significantly more financial difficulties, and having significantly more challenges paying for basic needs since the pandemic started.

When we split the sample by race and ethnicity, we observed that nearly 60% of Black and Latinx households reported experiencing material hardship by early September of 2020. Notably, we also observed that rates of material hardship for Black and Latinx households that reported being of middle and upper income in 2019 were significantly higher than for middle/upper income White households (see Figure 1). In contrast (also Figure 1) we observed that there were no differences among lower income White, Black, and Latinx households in terms of rates of material hardship. We will provide potential explanation for these findings based on prior research on structural racial inequalities and discuss potential policy solutions to address these disparities.

Authors

• Philip Andrew Fisher, University of Oregon
  Presenting Author

• Sara Weston, University of Oregon
  Non-Presenting Author