Search Results
Journal Article
The temporary labor force
Journal Article
Black/white differences in wealth
This article studies the extent to which the wide gap in the wealth holdings of whites and African Americans can be explained by differences in family income and demographic characteristics.
Journal Article
CRA and fair lending regulations: resulting trends in mortgage lending
This article provides background on the evolution of Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) and fair lending regulations, summarizes the relevant economic literature, and evaluates the effectiveness of the regulations by analyzing recent trends in mortgage lending activity. Are the trends in line with the intent of the regulations? Can the trends by attributed to the regulations?
Journal Article
Trends in homeownership: race, demographics, and income
The nation's homeownership rate recently reached an all-time high, with especially large gains among black households. This article quantifies the impact of underlying demographic and income trends on homeownership, concluding that while much of the increase in the aggregate homeownership rate can be attributed to faster growth in real incomes, the gains experienced by blacks may, in part, reflect a new regulatory environment.
Working Paper
Strategic responses to bank regulation: evidence from HMDA data
The intent of fair lending regulation is to encourage loans in low income areas and insure that loan decisions are based on economic criteria instead of noneconomic borrower characteristics. We evaluate situations in which banks may find it in their self interest to respond to regulation in a strategic manner intended to improve public relations and appease regulators rather than to adhere to the true spirit of the regulation. We find some evidence consistent with such behavior.
Newsletter
New data on mortgage lending
Newsletter
Mortgage trends in targeted markets
Working Paper
Flexible employment; composition and trends
Working Paper
The growth of temporary services work
Temporary services employment has expanded rapidly and now accounts for a sizable fraction of aggregate employment. The industry's workers are no longer overwhelmingly female or limited to clerical occupations. Temporary work is associated with variable weekly schedules and with part-year participation, but not with voluntarily part-time work. On average, temporary workers have less labor market security than permanent workers, being prone to both more unemployment and more underemployment. Relatively few of them, however, stay in temporary positions for as much as a year and the majority ...