Thomas M. Shapiro

Bio: Thomas M. Shapiro is an academic researcher from Brandeis University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Redistribution of income and wealth & Racism. The author has an hindex of 15, co-authored 34 publications receiving 4073 citations. Previous affiliations of Thomas M. Shapiro include Northeastern University & University of California, Santa Barbara.

Black Wealth, White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality.

Abstract: Black Wealth, White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality, by Melvin L. Oliver and Thomas M. Shapiro. New York and Great Britain: Routledge, 1995. 242 pp. $22.95, cloth. Reviewed by Rodney D. Green, Department of Economics, Howard University. Black Wealth, White Wealth opens with an evocative racial comparison of income and wealth which reveals that although half of the top 10 earners in the U.S. are Black, virtually no Blacks are included among the wealthiest 400 Americans. Indeed, the wealth levels for those Blacks who have "made it" into the American middle class are shown to be only 15% of the wealth level of Whites in the same income category. These and other presented data suggest that if Blacks are disadvantaged relative to Whites in terms of income-and they are, earning on average less than 60% of White household incomethen they are completely eclipsed when it comes to wealth. This tale of two middle classes is part of an even bleaker tale of two unequal nations within America, a tale Oliver and Shapiro attribute to three historical processes: the racialization of state policy, the economic detour, and the sedimentation of racial inequality. These three concepts reflect, respectively, how government policy has systematically reduced Black capacity to accumulate wealth by historically limiting access to land, housing, and other wealth builders; how Blacks have been prevented from forming thriving businesses because of institutional barriers to their serving the entire domestic market, leaving Blacks in impoverished niche businesses; and how the cumulative effects of Black oppression have cemented Blacks to the bottom of society's economic hierarchy. The story begins in chapter one, in which the authors revisit Reconstruction's failure to provide the freedmen with elementary productive property-the proverbial 40 acres and a mule. They move next to a review of the Federal Housing Administration's role in deliberately blocking Black home ownership from the 1930s through the 1970s, followed by a contemporary account of how redlining and mortgage discrimination have deepened Black economic deprivation. They also review the ways in which macroeconomic forces such as globalization and deindustrialization have undermined Black economic wellbeing. For example, they point out that these forces have eliminated over half of the Black industrial jobs in the Great Lakes area in the last two decades. In chapter two, Oliver and Shapiro sketch a sociology of race and wealth in America, wrestling (perhaps too briefly) with the race/class debate and invoking Marx and Weber. With this backdrop, they offer additional historical and anecdotal evidence for the three historical processes noted above. Chapter three presents a discussion of the data constraints past researchers have experienced in attempting to study wealth distribution in the U.S. The authors surmount such difficulties themselves by using the relatively new Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) data set to measure individual net worth (all wealth) and net financial assets (net worth minus housing equity and automobile value) as they artfully describe the trend of deepening economic inequality between the races since the 1980s. This theme is extended further in chapter four, in which two startling findings are highlighted: (a) though Black income has consistently hovered at around 60% of White income, Black wealth is only one-twelfth of White wealth; and (b) Black financial assets are, at the median, zero! Oliver and Shapiro go on to note that a large share of each race has no financial assets, and even larger shares of both races could not sustain lives even at poverty level for more than a few months if they lost their current income. The absolute wealth differences mentioned above conceal an even graver problem detailed in chapter five. Most Black wealth is shown to consist of home equity and automobile ownership while a substantial share of White wealth is shown to include financial assets, the key to wealth accumulation. …

The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality

Abstract: Over the past three decades, racial prejudice in America has declined significantly and many African American families have seen a steady rise in employment and annual income. But alongside these encouraging signs, Thomas Shapiro argues in The Hidden Cost of Being African American, fundamental levels of racial inequality persist, particularly in the area of asset accumulation--inheritance, savings accounts, stocks, bonds, home equity, and other investments-. Shapiro reveals how the lack of these family assets along with continuing racial discrimination in crucial areas like homeownership dramatically impact the everyday lives of many black families, reversing gains earned in schools and on jobs, and perpetuating the cycle of poverty in which far too many find themselves trapped. Shapiro uses a combination of in-depth interviews with almost 200 families from Los Angeles, Boston, and St. Louis, and national survey data with 10,000 families to show how racial inequality is transmitted across generations. We see how those families with private wealth are able to move up from generation to generation, relocating to safer communities with better schools and passing along the accompanying advantages to their children. At the same time those without significant wealth remain trapped in communities that don't allow them to move up, no matter how hard they work. Shapiro challenges white middle class families to consider how the privileges that wealth brings not only improve their own chances but also hold back people who don't have them. This "wealthfare" is a legacy of inequality that, if unchanged, will project social injustice far into the future. Showing that over half of black families fall below the asset poverty line at the beginning of the new century, The Hidden Cost of Being African American will challenge all Americans to reconsider what must be done to end racial inequality.

Black Wealth/White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality

Abstract: 1. Race, Wealth, and Equality 2. A Sociology of Wealth and Racial Inequality 3. Studying Wealth 4. Wealth and Inequality in America 5. A Story of Two Nations: Race and Wealth 6. The Structuring of Racial Inequality in American Life 7. Getting Along: Renewing America's Commitment to Racial Justice.

The Roots of the Widening Racial Wealth Gap: Explaining the Black-White Economic Divide

Abstract: All families need wealth to be economically secure and create opportunities for the next generation. Wealth what we own minus what we owe—allows families to move forward by moving to better and safer neighborhoods, investing in businesses, saving for retirement, and supporting their children’s college aspirations. Having a financial cushion also provides a measure of security when a job loss or other crisis strikes. The Great Recession of 2007-2009 devastated the wealth of all families except for those with the most. The unprecedented wealth destruction during that period, accompanied by long-term high unemployment, underscores the critical importance wealth plays in weathering emergencies and helping families move along a path toward long-term financial security and opportunity.

Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth

Abstract: This article conceptualizes community cultural wealth as a critical race theory (CRT) challenge to traditional interpretations of cultural capital. CRT shifts the research lens away from a deficit view of Communities of Color as places full of cultural poverty disadvantages, and instead focuses on and learns from the array of cultural knowledge, skills, abilities and contacts possessed by socially marginalized groups that often go unrecognized and unacknowledged. Various forms of capital nurtured through cultural wealth include aspirational, navigational, social, linguistic, familial and resistant capital. These forms of capital draw on the knowledges Students of Color bring with them from their homes and communities into the classroom. This CRT approach to education involves a commitment to develop schools that acknowledge the multiple strengths of Communities of Color in order to serve a larger purpose of struggle toward social and racial justice.

Social Dominance: An Intergroup Theory of Social Hierarchy and Oppression

Abstract: Part I. From There to Here - Theoretical Background: 1. From visiousness to viciousness: theories of intergroup relations 2. Social dominance theory as a new synthesis Part II. Oppression and its Psycho-Ideological Elements: 3. The psychology of group dominance: social dominance orientation 4. Let's both agree that you're really stupid: the power of consensual ideology Part III. The Circle of Oppression - The Myriad Expressions of Institutional Discrimination: 5. You stay in your part of town and I'll stay in mine: discrimination in the housing and retail markets 6. They're just too lazy to work: discrimination in the labor market 7. They're just mentally and physically unfit: discrimination in education and health care 8. The more of 'them' in prison, the better: institutional terror, social control and the dynamics of the criminal justice system Part IV. Oppression as a Cooperative Game: 9. Social hierarchy and asymmetrical group behavior: social hierarchy and group difference in behavior 10. Sex and power: the intersecting political psychologies of patriarchy and empty-set hierarchy 11. Epilogue.

Decolonization is not a metaphor

Abstract: Our goal in this article is to remind readers what is unsettling about decolonization. Decolonization brings about the repatriation of Indigenous land and life; it is not a metaphor for other things we want to do to improve our societies and schools. The easy adoption of decolonizing discourse by educational advocacy and scholarship, evidenced by the increasing number of calls to “decolonize our schools,” or use “decolonizing methods,” or, “decolonize student thinking”, turns decolonization into a metaphor. As important as their goals may be, social justice, critical methodologies, or approaches that decenter settler perspectives have objectives that may be incommensurable with decolonization. Because settler colonialism is built upon an entangled triad structure of settler-native-slave, the decolonial desires of white, non-white, immigrant, postcolonial, and oppressed people, can similarly be entangled in resettlement, reoccupation, and reinhabitation that actually further settler colonialism. The metaphorization of decolonization makes possible a set of evasions, or “settler moves to innocence”, that problematically attempt to reconcile settler guilt and complicity, and rescue settler futurity. In this article, we analyze multiple settler moves towards innocence in order to forward “an ethic of incommensurability” that recognizes what is distinct and what is sovereign for project(s) of decolonization in relation to human and civil rights based social justice projects. We also point to unsettling themes within transnational/Third World decolonizations, abolition, and critical space-place pedagogies, which challenge the coalescence of social justice endeavors, making room for more meaningful potential alliances.

Racial Residential Segregation: A Fundamental Cause of Racial Disparities in Health:

Abstract: Racial residential segregation is a fundamental cause of racial disparities in health. The physical separation of the races by enforced residence in certain areas is an institutional mechanism of racism that was designed to protect whites from social interaction with blacks. Despite the absence of supportive legal statutes, the degree of residential segregation remains extremely high for most African Americans in the United States. The authors review evidence that suggests that segregation is a primary cause of racial differences in socioeconomic status (SES) by determining access to education and employment opportunities. SES in turn remains a fundamental cause of racial differences in health. Segregation also creates conditions inimical to health in the social and physical environment. The authors conclude that effective efforts to eliminate racial disparities in health must seriously confront segregation and its pervasive consequences.