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Title: Race and Home Ownership in Twentieth Century America: the Role of Sample Composition

Citation Type: Working Paper

Publication Year: 2001

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Abstract: In our previous work we used the various twentieth century Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) samples of federal population censuses (1900-20, 1940, 1960-90) to study the long-run evolution of racial differences in home ownership and housing values among adult male household heads (Ruggles and Sobek 1997). However, as noted above, the proportion of black households headed by females has increased relative to the proportion among whites. Consequently, to the extent that gender is a numerically significant correlate of home ownership and house value, focusing solely on male household heads may give a misleading portrait of racial change over time. Here, we extend our previous work by expanding the samples to include female household heads, to assess the exposure of children to home ownership, and to observe how the rise of female headship may relate to childrens exposure to ownership. We begin by comparing levels and trends in ownership rates and housing values across samples consisting of all household heads, and then separately by gender. In fact, since the all-household sample is simply a weighted average of the male and female samples, we can mechanically understand all the household trends by observing the male and female trends and changes in the implicit weight given to female heads in forming the all-household average. We find that in levels and in trends of ownership and value, the male and female samples are similar (within race categories) up to around 1940: that is, white (or black) female-headed households were about as likely to own homes as white (or black) male-headed households, and their homes were about 90 percent as valuable as male-owned homes. Sometime after 1940, however, the two types of samples began to diverge, and at the same time, female-heads were becoming a larger proportion of all household heads. By 1980, male-headed households had ownership rates about 20 points higher than female-headed households, and among owners, the property of female household heads had fallen to about 75 percent of the value of male-headed households. As the female samples diverged from the male samples, and as the number of female heads grew faster than the number of male heads, the influence of females on the movement of the overall racial gap in housing outcomes became stronger. For example, we find that racial convergence of ownership rates among male heads between 1960 and 1990 was not complemented by convergence among female heads (nor by convergence of females on males), plus the weight given to female heads among blacks increased by more than it did among whites, and through both channels, overall racial convergence in ownership was dampened...

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Authors: Collins, William J.; Margo, Robert A.

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Publication Number: 01-W10

Institution: Vanderbilt University

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Publisher Location: Nashville, TN

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Housing and Segregation, Race and Ethnicity

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