Isolated, Vulnerable And Broke

[groovedaddy]

ACCORDING to a new study by the Pew Research Center, Hispanic families saw the largest decline in wealth of any racial or ethnic group in the country during the latter half of the last decade: from 2005 to 2009, their median wealth fell by an astounding 66 percent. The reason? The implosion of the housing market, where Hispanic families had invested much of their wealth.

But that’s only the latest chapter in a much longer story. Over the past two decades Hispanics have moved from the middle of the socioeconomic hierarchy, between blacks and whites, to a position below both. On virtually every indicator of socioeconomic welfare, Hispanics fell relative to blacks.

This has nothing to do with nativist tropes like work ethic or resistance to assimilation and everything to do with misguided government policy: our immigration and border-control system has created a class of people cut off from traditional legal and economic structures and thus vulnerable to the worst depredations of the market system.

During the housing bubble, those depredations came in the form of predatory lenders, driven by the boom in mortgage-backed securities. Before that, minorities had generally been shunned by lenders, which tended to be risk averse and discriminatory.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/05/opinion/hispanic-families-isolated-and-broke.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1

[snappyturtle]

1. It time this country admits that there are way too many suffering

under the guise of opportunity and I don't care where people came from. They're here so let's address the problem.

[dtexdem]

2. And Hispanics tend to have among the strongest work ethics.

But that's the nation's history: prosper from the hard labor of others and then treat them like shit.

[groovedaddy]

3. Amen! n.t

[demguy72340]

4. indeed

[cutlassmama]

5. +2