Final Project: Generational Effects of Inequality

Diclaimer: the epigenetics content is quite basic and simplified here, but it does still explain how social and environmental can effect people's biology

Anthropology 315

18 December 2020

Generational Effects of Inequality

Economic inequality in the United States was getting smaller during the Great Depression and after World War II. It wasn’t until the mid 1970s that income inequality began to rise again. And the growth of income has been disproportionately rising for the extremely rich (Drennan 8-9). When money collects in the hands of the rich and the few, most of the money does not get spent because of their low marginal propensity to consume (if they already have $1 billion, when they receive another $1,000, they are highly unlikely to spend that $1,000 very quickly or at all; the proportion of extra income they spend on consumption is very low). Another consequence of this phenomenon is unequal distribution of power. Money buys goods and services, and the more and higher quality goods and services you receive equals power. Power is a zero sum game, so as soon as it collects in the hands of the few, the majority of people suffer as their power lessens and their voices get stamped out and go unheard. A country’s economy, built like a pyramid with the top too heavy with wealth, the middle weathering away, and a hollow base creaking under the weight and wobbling from the lack of stability will eventually give way and collapse. That is how income inequality affects everyone in the economy and why it is important to close the gap; bring the weight of wealth from the top and pour it down to the bottom, like filling a water glass, until the economic pyramid can rest steady again. The power to improve living standards would be in the hands of the many rather than the few. 

However, this wealth gap comes with its own (racial) inequities. For example, the U.S. Black population sits around 13 percent, yet they are the group to bear the brunt of U.S. structural inequality. The inequality comes from the country’s roots in discrimination of anyone perceived to be Black, from slavery to pre-modern segregationist Jim Crow laws. And it still persists because the power structure has not yet fully addressed it. Which has been made clear by the disproportionate amount of Black people subject to low socioeconomic status in America. The poverty cycle is especially hard for them to escape because their communities tend to have access to lower quality education. This structural inequality prevents a large portion of the U.S. population from improving their human capital and slows economic growth (affecting everyone) which can be measured in the cost of high school dropouts. A high school dropout will earn $1 million dollars less in their lifetime than a college graduate, and that costs the economy $260,000 per dropout in lost earnings, taxes and productivity (Amos 11). There is less economic mobility for poor Black Americans than poor White Americans. Either group can be a high school dropout and be subject to the poverty cycle, but because lower-income ($40,000) White families are more likely to have better neighborhood resources than higher-income ($75,000) Black families, it is more likely for Whites to attain better quality education (without any stereotypes holding them back) and emerge from the poverty cycle (Logan 18, 20). A Black individual may also be more likely to be a high school dropout because of stereotype threat. A stereotype threat is a type of internalized racism, which is when a person believes racist ideas about themselves. For example, if a Black person internalizes the racist stereotype, or is simply reminded of their race before a test, they are more likely to not do well or even decide school is not for them (Uy Week 15). Black students perform better if the stereotype threat is neutralized, like when an exam is presented as a puzzle rather than an academic achievement test (Nisbett 2009). Unfortunately even when Black families obtain graduate or professional degrees the racial wealth gap persists, accruing $200,000 less wealth than Whites with similar education (Jones). Redistribution of wealth from the richest one percent to Black neighborhoods, and others in need, to invest in communal resources would be a great first step towards reducing inequality. Access to higher quality education, mental health resources, and other means that allow for a focus beyond survival, from the redistribution would likely make it easier for more to emerge from the poverty cycle and soon they would be their own sources of wealth and improve economic growth. 

Although reduced income can affect which house someone can afford and thereby affect how much pollution they are exposed to, race and environmental inequality happen to be even more strongly correlated than income and environmental inequality (Salazar et al. 598). This racially patterned inequality persists in forty out of the fifty states. A closer look can be taken with a study in Florida. The research was conducted using TRI (Toxic Release Inventory) facility and Census block group data was used to estimate potential pollution exposure with the understanding that exposure is more severe at closer proximities and diminishes rapidly as distance increases. Only about fourteen percent of households in the state are located within one mile of a polluting facility, yet 27.9 percent of low-income Black households, compared to 14.57 percent for low-income Whites, live within that one mile (Pollock III and Vittas 300-301). Adjusting for background factors, such as employment patterns (including health risk exposure) and housing values, low-income Blacks still live significantly closer to potential pollution than low-income Whites who actually live farther away from potential pollution (Pollock III and Vittas 303, 305). It could be argued that the deindustrialization of the U.S. should be reducing the effects of pollution. However, even though pollution is less than before, when people lose their industrial jobs to deindustrialization they lose wealth and the power to control how polluted their neighborhood will be (Salazar et al. 600). This is a very real concern considering there is also a racial gap between who causes air pollution and who breathes it (Lambert). And the “Not In My Back-Yard” campaign reinforces this phenomenon. It diverts pollution to the socially marginalized (Pollock III and Vittas 294-295) 

It is important for everyone to have minimal exposure to pollution in order to have a sustainable economy. It doesn’t matter how much money you have if your house is burning down along with everybody else’s. Once everything is ash there is no economy, there is no way to recover your wealth and frankly there is no way to survive. That is why environmental reform is so important. Re-educating fossil-fuel energy workers to work in sustainable energy would be a way of providing our people with more stable and usually safer jobs investing in the future. A healthier community means a more productive workforce and a growing economy. Typically these cries for environmental reform are labeled “liberal,” but the American Conservation Coalition (ACC) is a conservative group that agrees economic prosperity cannot exist without environmental sustainability. Their mission statement and capitalism principle imply a desire to return to capitalism the way it was originally structured by Adam Smith (“About ACC”). Smith is often cited for his laissez-faire approach, but he also emphasizes competitive markets (which occur in the absence of monopolies and oligopolies) and subsistence wages (providing workers with sufficient resources). A great example of how capitalism and environmental reform can work hand in hand is the carbon credit system. Credit is familiar to a capitalist society and is used to fund major industrial change without an abrupt shock (Mathews 3633). Eighty-two percent of Americans already think protecting the environment benefits or does not affect the economy (Leiserowitz et al.), but its association with “liberals” is detracting. The ACC does good work doing its part to take the partisanship out of environmental reform that will help the economy and everyone in it. Once people allow for environmental reform even if income inequality remains, low-socioeconomic status groups would benefit from the mitigation of stress, or the reduction in allostatic load.

The greater the allostatic load an individual experiences the greater the limitation on their growth or achievement despite their potential (Uy Week 13). High allostatic load from pollution and chronic stress, especially early in life, can alter a person’s epigenome. The epigenome refers to the “tags,” such as DNA methylation, on DNA that dictates whether or not genes should be expressed. In general, if a gene is methylated it is not read and the proteins it codes for are not made. All cells contain the same DNA, and DNA contains code for all of our body’s functions, so turning off some code would make sense in order for a stomach cell to strictly do stomach cell things and a brain cell to strictly do brain cell things. However, the body can also react with methylation to a chronic stressor and can negatively impact an individual’s ability to manage stress or perform other important biological functions (Uy Week 15). Preterm births are a common marker of high allostatic load in mothers. Self-reported experiences of discrimination, as well as pollutant exposure have been linked to incidence of preterm births (Gravlee 52, Laurent et al. 1479). Preterm babies, later in life, are more likely to have “impaired vision, hearing, and cognitive function, decreased motor function and behavioral disorders” (Laurent et al. 1479). Therefore, the effects of inequality, which disproportionately affect the Black population in the U.S., could be transgenerational. If a family has limited access to resources to manage a preterm birth’s adverse effects, the child might experience more stress from their disability/disabilities. This could make transgenerational epigenetic effects persist or worsen when another generation is born. 

Race itself is not relevant to socioeconomic status and pollutant exposure. The differences in U.S. communities is not from inherent biological differences, they are from the structural inequality made possible by cultural perceptions of different races. The structural inequality is what forces groups who have been mistreated based on the color of their skin to embody their lived experiences that changes their biology. It is important to note positive experiences like eating healthy and exercising well can positively alter a person’s epigenetics, and those DNA methylations can be passed down to future generations. When the U.S. takes care of its communities, it invests in its future. Ignoring violations of equity is not an option.

Figures

Bibliography

“About ACC.” American Conservation Coalition, 2020, https://www.acc.eco/about-acc. Accessed 18 December 2020.

Amos, Jason. Dropouts, Diplomas, and Dollars: U.S. High Schools and the Nation's Economy. Alliance for Excellent Education, 2008.

Antrosio, Jason. “Race Becomes Biology, Inequality Embodied.” Living Anthropologically, 2020, https://www.livinganthropologically.com/biological-anthropology/how-race-becomes-biology/.

Drennan, Matthew P. Income Inequality : Why It Matters and Why Most Economists Didn't Notice. Yale University Press, 2015. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/csulb/detail.action?docID=4093150.

Gates, Jr., Henry Louis, and Steele M. Claude. “A Conversation with Claude M. Steele: Stereotype Threat and Black Achievement.” Du Bois Review, vol. 6, no. 2, 2009, pp. 251-271.

Gravlee, Clarence C. “How Race Becomes Biology: Embodiment of Social Inequality.” American Journal of Physical Anthropology, vol. 139, 2009, pp. 47-57.

Jones, Janelle. “The racial wealth gap: How African-Americans have been shortchanged out of the materials to build wealth.” Economic Policy Institute, 2017, https://www.epi.org/blog/the-racial-wealth-gap-how-african-americans-have-been-shortchanged-out-of-the-materials-to-build-wealth/. Accessed 18 December 2020.

Lambert, Jonathan. “Study Finds Racial Gap Between Who Causes Air Pollution and Who Breathes It.” NPR: Shots, https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/03/11/702348935/study-finds-racial-gap-between-who-causes-air-pollution-and-who-breathes-it.

Laurent, Olivier, et al. “A Statewide Nested Case-Control Study of Preterm Birth and Air Pollution by Source and Composition: California, 2001-2008.” Environmental Health Perspectives, vol. 124, no. 9, 2016, pp. 1479-1486.

Leiserowitz, Anthony, et al. “Environmental Protection Improves Jobs and the Economy.” Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, 2016, https://climatecommunication.yale.edu/publications/protecting-the-environment-improves-the-economy-provides-jobs-majorities-sa/. Accessed 18 December 2020.

Logan, John R. Diversity and Disparities: America Enters a New Century. The Russell Sage Foundation, 2014.

Mathews, John A. “How carbon credits could drive the emergence of renewable energies.” Energy Policy, vol. 36, no. 10, 2008, pp. 3633-3639.

Nisbett, Richard E. Education Is All in Your Mind. The New York Times, 2009, https://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/opinion/08nisbett.html.

Pollock III, Philip H., and M. Elliot Vittas. “Who Bears the Burdens of Environmental Pollution? Race, Ethnicity, and Environmental Equity in Florida.” Social Science Quarterly, vol. 76, no. 2, 1995, pp. 294-310.

Salazar, Debra J., et al. “Race, Income, and Environmental Inequality in the U.S. States, 1990-2014.” Social Science Quarterly, vol. 100, no. 3, 2019, pp. 592-603.

Uy, Jeanelle. “Epigenetics.” Week 15: How Racism Influences Biology, Week 15.

Uy, Jeanelle. “How Racism Influences Biology.” Week 15: How Racism Influences Biology, Week 15.

Uy, Jeanelle. “Intelligence and Eugenics.” Week 13: Eugenics, Week 13.

Statement

I actually was first inspired by Tina Lasisi’s blog. She suggested that people in other fields can also address racial inequity in their own way. I study economics and wanted to do something to make an impact. I found an NPR podcast that reminded me of the racial and economic disparities between those who live in polluted neighborhoods and those who do not. I also came across William Spriggs’s letter “Is now a teachable moment for economists?” while sifting through Marketplace podcasts. He mentioned a couple things I had not considered yet. The one that struck me the most was how economists don’t look at the origins of tangible racial disparities, they simply acknowledge race is a cultural creation and just look at the statistical analysis of race on the surface. This leads to active discrimination because it is “logical” to reject an job applicant because he is Black and Black people are more likely to lie on their resume. He also expressed concern in how few White economists read Black economists work. I was already attached to a topic idea relating to race and environment from the NPR podcast but I also really wanted to do something that could complement Sprigg’s letter, but in the end I had to simplify. I ended up just maintaining the inspiration from the NPR podcast and adding economics though discussion of income inequality. I thought I could write about income inequality, how that affects where you can live and this increases the chances of living near pollution if you are poor and then how all that stress can affect your epigenetics. I just wanted to outline the whole, compounding, chain reaction. 

For my medium I really wanted to do an infographic or at least something more creative than an essay. But I got so caught up on the medium for a couple days so I figured that could just not be the way to go if I ever wanted to finish the project. I officially decided on an essay for my medium because I realized that is how I’m used to developing my complex thoughts and research.

I think I did a pretty good job on my essay. I’m pretty proud of it after all the brainstorming and researching I did. Plus I loved the researching part, trying to figure out the “whys” and “hows” for everything, and I hope that came through in my essay. I believe I deserve an A because of how hard I worked synthesizing data from like three different areas and because I felt good about how the flow of the essay turned out.