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Black households face greater financial devastation due to COVID-19 shutdowns
New research spotlights how low-income Black households face greater financial distress and vulnerability as a result of the pandemic economic crisis.
- A paper by a team of Princeton researchers highlights devastating socioeconomic inequalities between racial groups worsened by the pandemic shutdowns.
- By the middle of June, the rates of new debt were similar for Black and Latinx households at more than 80%, while about 70% of white households reported new debt.
- When the pandemic ends, tens of millions of households will still find themselves stuck in a devastating financial hole, and a disproportionate amount of those will be Black and Latinx households.
Researchers from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs are reporting that low-income Black households are facing greater economic precarity and vulnerability as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic as compared to white or Latinx low-income households.
A snowballing crisis
We've known that COVID-19 has been disproportionately fatal to Black Americans as compared to white, non-Latinx Americans, and that these deaths (as well as hospitalizations) have shone a nasty light on racial disparities undergirding the U.S. healthcare system. But now a team of researchers from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs are highlighting devastating socioeconomic inequalities exacerbated by the pandemic. Their report details how low-income Black households experienced higher rates of job loss, greater uncertainty accessing food and medical resources, and higher rates of debt than white or Latinx low-income households.
The paper, published in the journal Socius, is the first of its kind offering systemic, comprehensive, and descriptive estimates of the impacts of COVID-19 crisis on low-income Americans from March 2020 to mid-June. The authors' findings spotlight a snowballing crisis in which a growing number of families with low-income reported financial insecurity, then took on more debt to manage their expenses for resources.The study
The authors aimed to determine the economic impacts of the pandemic on lower income Americans, and spotlight racial disparities within that socioeconomic group. They analyzed factors a family needs to satisfy basic survival needs including job loss, housing instability, and insecurity around food and medical resources.
"Media coverage has focused on the racially disparate effects of Covid-19 as a disease, but we were interested in the socioeconomic effects of the virus, and whether it tracked a similar pattern," said study co-author Adam Goldstein, assistant professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton's School of Public and International Affairs in a Princeton University press release.
Goldstein noted that it was clear that Black households in America were disproportionately affected amongst low-income households who struggled at the beginning of the pandemic.
"Even among low-income populations, there is a marked racial disparity in people's vulnerability to this crisis," said study co-author Diana Enriquez, a doctoral candidate in Princeton's Department of Sociology.
For the study, the researchers used data that came from two different tracking surveys. The primary data source was a bimonthly survey series of Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients. The respondents were recruited through the mobile app, FreshEBT, for managing SNAP benefits. Also used was the U.S. Census Bureau's publicly available Household Pulse Survey, which is drawn from representative household samples rather than solely from program recipients. Using these sources, the authors surveyed people who were using the SNAP and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits prior to the COVID-19 crisis. Several waves of surveys were sent out between the end of March and mid-June, a window of time when Americans were starting to feel the first economic hits of the shutdowns, but before their economic status had been transformed in a major way.
Participants were asked about their present and perceived situation related to employment status, housing status, ability to access food and medical resources, and amount of debt. For instance, survey respondents were asked if they currently had stable housing and also if they believed their housing status would be stable after that 30-day period.
Major Findings
The authors found that lower-income Americans who were already receiving government assistance had experienced major impacts in all areas except for housing status. Here were the major findings from each survey wave between the end of April and mid-June:
- Nearly 35 percent of all survey respondents reported losing their jobs by mid-June.
- 67 percent said that they missed paying at least one bill at the beginning of the shutdown.
- 77 percent of households reported missing a bill or payment on their rent.
- 54 percent of individuals said they had skipped meals, were dependent on friends and family for food, or had visited a food pantry due to the shutdown, despite being covered by SNAP. (This figure rose to 64 percent by the end of the month of June.)
But when the researchers looked at the data in race categories, it was clear that, on average, low-income Black households had taken much greater hits than low-income white households had. The magnitude of racial differences varied across indicators and data sources, but Black respondents fared consistently worse than non-Hispanic whites in both survey data sets, and Latinx respondents fared worse than whites in the Household Pulse Survey.
Here were the major findings when evaluated on race:
- At the start of April 2020, 30 percent of Black households reported a job loss. By the end of the month that number rose to 48 percent.
- 80 percent of Black households surveyed reported taking on greater debt to cover their bills by the end of April 2020.
- By the middle of June, the rates of new debt were similar for Black and Latinx households at more than 80 percent, while about 70 percent of white households reported new debt.
Implications
These survey results have put a magnifying glass on how badly the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted vulnerable households who were already living near the poverty line.
"Research shows that these types of debts and unpaid bills — even small ones — can compound over time and trap low-income households in a cycle of financial distress," Goldstein said. And when the survey results are analyzed for differences amongst racial groups, it's clear that those most vulnerable to this snowballing financial devastation are Black and Latnix households.
Ultimately, this research shines a light on a disturbing truth emphasized by Goldstein: "Even in a miraculous scenario where the pandemic ends in a few months and low-wage workers are rehired, tens of millions of households will still find themselves stuck in a financial hole without additional infusions of economic relief."
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Every 27.5 million years, the Earth’s heart beats catastrophically
Geologists discover a rhythm to major geologic events.
- It appears that Earth has a geologic "pulse," with clusters of major events occurring every 27.5 million years.
- Working with the most accurate dating methods available, the authors of the study constructed a new history of the last 260 million years.
- Exactly why these cycles occur remains unknown, but there are some interesting theories.
Our hearts beat at a resting rate of 60 to 100 beats per minute. Lots of other things pulse, too. The colors we see and the pitches we hear, for example, are due to the different wave frequencies ("pulses") of light and sound waves.
Now, a study in the journal Geoscience Frontiers finds that Earth itself has a pulse, with one "beat" every 27.5 million years. That's the rate at which major geological events have been occurring as far back as geologists can tell.
A planetary calendar has 10 dates in red
Credit: Jagoush / Adobe Stock
According to lead author and geologist Michael Rampino of New York University's Department of Biology, "Many geologists believe that geological events are random over time. But our study provides statistical evidence for a common cycle, suggesting that these geologic events are correlated and not random."
The new study is not the first time that there's been a suggestion of a planetary geologic cycle, but it's only with recent refinements in radioisotopic dating techniques that there's evidence supporting the theory. The authors of the study collected the latest, best dating for 89 known geologic events over the last 260 million years:
- 29 sea level fluctuations
- 12 marine extinctions
- 9 land-based extinctions
- 10 periods of low ocean oxygenation
- 13 gigantic flood basalt volcanic eruptions
- 8 changes in the rate of seafloor spread
- 8 times there were global pulsations in interplate magmatism
The dates provided the scientists a new timetable of Earth's geologic history.
Tick, tick, boom
Credit: New York University
Putting all the events together, the scientists performed a series of statistical analyses that revealed that events tend to cluster around 10 different dates, with peak activity occurring every 27.5 million years. Between the ten busy periods, the number of events dropped sharply, approaching zero.
Perhaps the most fascinating question that remains unanswered for now is exactly why this is happening. The authors of the study suggest two possibilities:
"The correlations and cyclicity seen in the geologic episodes may be entirely a function of global internal Earth dynamics affecting global tectonics and climate, but similar cycles in the Earth's orbit in the Solar System and in the Galaxy might be pacing these events. Whatever the origins of these cyclical episodes, their occurrences support the case for a largely periodic, coordinated, and intermittently catastrophic geologic record, which is quite different from the views held by most geologists."
Assuming the researchers' calculations are at least roughly correct — the authors note that different statistical formulas may result in further refinement of their conclusions — there's no need to worry that we're about to be thumped by another planetary heartbeat. The last occurred some seven million years ago, meaning the next won't happen for about another 20 million years.
Making memories actually involves breaking our DNA, study shows
Brain cells snap strands of DNA in many more places and cell types than researchers previously thought.
The urgency to remember a dangerous experience requires the brain to make a series of potentially dangerous moves: Neurons and other brain cells snap open their DNA in numerous locations — more than previously realized, according to a new study — to provide quick access to genetic instructions for the mechanisms of memory storage.
The extent of these DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) in multiple key brain regions is surprising and concerning, says study senior author Li-Huei Tsai, Picower Professor of Neuroscience at MIT and director of The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory, because while the breaks are routinely repaired, that process may become more flawed and fragile with age. Tsai's lab has shown that lingering DSBs are associated with neurodegeneration and cognitive decline and that repair mechanisms can falter.
"We wanted to understand exactly how widespread and extensive this natural activity is in the brain upon memory formation because that can give us insight into how genomic instability could undermine brain health down the road," says Tsai, who is also a professor in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and a leader of MIT's Aging Brain Initiative. "Clearly, memory formation is an urgent priority for healthy brain function, but these new results showing that several types of brain cells break their DNA in so many places to quickly express genes is still striking."
Tracking breaks
In 2015, Tsai's lab provided the first demonstration that neuronal activity caused DSBs and that they induced rapid gene expression. But those findings, mostly made in lab preparations of neurons, did not capture the full extent of the activity in the context of memory formation in a behaving animal, and did not investigate what happened in cells other than neurons.
In the new study published July 1 in PLOS ONE, lead author and former graduate student Ryan Stott and co-author and former research technician Oleg Kritsky sought to investigate the full landscape of DSB activity in learning and memory. To do so, they gave mice little electrical zaps to the feet when they entered a box, to condition a fear memory of that context. They then used several methods to assess DSBs and gene expression in the brains of the mice over the next half-hour, particularly among a variety of cell types in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus, two regions essential for the formation and storage of conditioned fear memories. They also made measurements in the brains of mice that did not experience the foot shock to establish a baseline of activity for comparison.
The creation of a fear memory doubled the number of DSBs among neurons in the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex, affecting more than 300 genes in each region. Among 206 affected genes common to both regions, the researchers then looked at what those genes do. Many were associated with the function of the connections neurons make with each other, called synapses. This makes sense because learning arises when neurons change their connections (a phenomenon called "synaptic plasticity") and memories are formed when groups of neurons connect together into ensembles called engrams.
"Many genes essential for neuronal function and memory formation, and significantly more of them than expected based on previous observations in cultured neurons … are potentially hotspots of DSB formation," the authors wrote in the study.
In another analysis, the researchers confirmed through measurements of RNA that the increase in DSBs indeed correlated closely with increased transcription and expression of affected genes, including ones affecting synapse function, as quickly as 10-30 minutes after the foot shock exposure.
"Overall, we find transcriptional changes are more strongly associated with [DSBs] in the brain than anticipated," they wrote. "Previously we observed 20 gene-associated [DSB] loci following stimulation of cultured neurons, while in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex we see more than 100-150 gene associated [DSB] loci that are transcriptionally induced."
Snapping with stress
In the analysis of gene expression, the neuroscientists looked at not only neurons but also non-neuronal brain cells, or glia, and found that they also showed changes in expression of hundreds of genes after fear conditioning. Glia called astrocytes are known to be involved in fear learning, for instance, and they showed significant DSB and gene expression changes after fear conditioning.
Among the most important functions of genes associated with fear conditioning-related DSBs in glia was the response to hormones. The researchers therefore looked to see which hormones might be particularly involved and discovered that it was glutocortocoids, which are secreted in response to stress. Sure enough, the study data showed that in glia, many of the DSBs that occurred following fear conditioning occurred at genomic sites related to glutocortocoid receptors. Further tests revealed that directly stimulating those hormone receptors could trigger the same DSBs that fear conditioning did and that blocking the receptors could prevent transcription of key genes after fear conditioning.
Tsai says the finding that glia are so deeply involved in establishing memories from fear conditioning is an important surprise of the new study.
"The ability of glia to mount a robust transcriptional response to glutocorticoids suggest that glia may have a much larger role to play in the response to stress and its impact on the brain during learning than previously appreciated," she and her co-authors wrote.
Damage and danger?
More research will have to be done to prove that the DSBs required for forming and storing fear memories are a threat to later brain health, but the new study only adds to evidence that it may be the case, the authors say.
"Overall we have identified sites of DSBs at genes important for neuronal and glial functions, suggesting that impaired DNA repair of these recurrent DNA breaks which are generated as part of brain activity could result in genomic instability that contribute to aging and disease in the brain," they wrote.
The National Institutes of Health, The Glenn Foundation for Medical Research, and the JPB Foundation provided funding for the research.
Reprinted with permission of MIT News. Read the original article.
Babble hypothesis shows key factor to becoming a leader
Research shows that those who spend more time speaking tend to emerge as the leaders of groups, regardless of their intelligence.
Man speaking in front of a group.
- A new study proposes the "babble hypothesis" of becoming a group leader.
- Researchers show that intelligence is not the most important factor in leadership.
- Those who talk the most tend to emerge as group leaders.
If you want to become a leader, start yammering. It doesn't even necessarily matter what you say. New research shows that groups without a leader can find one if somebody starts talking a lot.
This phenomenon, described by the "babble hypothesis" of leadership, depends neither on group member intelligence nor personality. Leaders emerge based on the quantity of speaking, not quality.
Researcher Neil G. MacLaren, lead author of the study published in The Leadership Quarterly, believes his team's work may improve how groups are organized and how individuals within them are trained and evaluated.
"It turns out that early attempts to assess leadership quality were found to be highly confounded with a simple quantity: the amount of time that group members spoke during a discussion," shared MacLaren, who is a research fellow at Binghamton University.
While we tend to think of leaders as people who share important ideas, leadership may boil down to whoever "babbles" the most. Understanding the connection between how much people speak and how they become perceived as leaders is key to growing our knowledge of group dynamics.
The power of babble
The research involved 256 college students, divided into 33 groups of four to ten people each. They were asked to collaborate on either a military computer simulation game (BCT Commander) or a business-oriented game (CleanStart). The players had ten minutes to plan how they would carry out a task and 60 minutes to accomplish it as a group. One person in the group was randomly designated as the "operator," whose job was to control the user interface of the game.
To determine who became the leader of each group, the researchers asked the participants both before and after the game to nominate one to five people for this distinction. The scientists found that those who talked more were also more likely to be nominated. This remained true after controlling for a number of variables, such as previous knowledge of the game, various personality traits, or intelligence.
How leaders influence people to believe | Michael Dowling | Big Think www.youtube.com
In an interview with PsyPost, MacLaren shared that "the evidence does seem consistent that people who speak more are more likely to be viewed as leaders."
Another find was that gender bias seemed to have a strong effect on who was considered a leader. "In our data, men receive on average an extra vote just for being a man," explained MacLaren. "The effect is more extreme for the individual with the most votes."
The first three minutes: going backward to the beginning of time with Steven Weinberg (Part 1)
The great theoretical physicist Steven Weinberg passed away on July 23. This is our tribute.
