Xi Song - Sociology, University of Pennsylvania
Racial Differences in Exposure to Unemployment: A Kinship Perspective
Date: 09/23/2021 (Thu)
Time: 3:30pm- 5:00pm
Location: This seminar will be held remotely via Zoom. (Please sign in to see the link.)
Organizer: Marcos Rangel
Meeting Schedule: (Not currently open for scheduling. Please contact the seminar organizer listed above.)
All meetings will be held in the same location as the seminar unless otherwise noted.
9:30am - OPEN
10:00am - OPEN
10:30am - Yuan Zhang
11:00am - OPEN
11:30am - OPEN
1:00pm - Jessi Streib
1:30pm - Marwa AlFakhri
2:00pm - OPEN
2:30pm - Joe Hotz
3:00pm - Seminar Prep
3:30pm - Seminar Presentation (3:30pm to 5:00pm)
Additional Comments: Studies on unemployment typically assess its costs on the individual level. However, when unemployment occurs, individuals, their families, and their kin all lose. Close kin provide the majority of social support for unemployed adults. Applying demographic and statistical techniques to official statistics and multiple survey datasets, we assess the prevalence of and exposure to unemployment in the United States from a kinship perspective. The results indicate dramatic racial disparities in the number of unemployed kin and the number of kin who would be affected by an unemployed person. Specifically, during the pandemic-induced recession, black Americans have 1.7unemployed people in their extended family compared to 1.2 among whites. Further,every job loss in a black extended family affects approximately 23 related members of the family through kinship ties, but this number among whites is only about 20. The findings of this study draw attention to the need for an understanding of unemployment and its demographic implications, which are stratified by race.