FACT BRIEF

Does Boston have the greatest income inequality of any American city?

Thursday, January 14, 2021

By Mia Dillon

Copy link

Copy featured image

YES

A 2016 Brookings analysis found that Boston was the “most unequal” big city in America. Top-earning households made nearly 18 times as much as the lowest-earning households. The entire Boston metro area ranked no. 6.

A 2015 report by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, Duke University and the New School found marked racial disparities in terms of wealth across Boston's metro area. White households had a median wealth of $247,500. Dominican and U.S.-born Black households had “a median wealth close to zero” (only $8 for Black households).

A racial wealth gap isn't unique to Boston. A 2016 study found major gaps between whites and Blacks across the U.S. using multiple financial yardsticks, including bankruptcies; stock, business and home ownership; inheritance, and income.

This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.

Sources

Brookings: City and metropolitan inequality on the rise, driven by declining incomes

SSRN: The color of wealth in Boston

Springer: Race and Social Problems—Wealth inequality in Black and white

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR

Gigafact

Between 2020 and 2022, under close editorial supervision, Gigafact contracted a group of freelance writers and editors to test the concepts for fact briefs and provide inputs to our software development process. We call this effort Gigafact Foundry. Over the course of these two years, Gigafact Foundry writers published over 1500 fact briefs in response to claims they found online. Their important work forms the basis of Gigafact formats and editorial guidelines, and is available to the public on Gigafact.org. Readers should be aware that while there is still a lot of relevant information to be found, not all fact briefs produced by Gigafact Foundry reflect Gigafact's current methods and standards for fact briefs. If you come across any that you feel are out of date and need to be looked at with fresh eyes, don't hesitate to contact us at support@gigafact.org.

FACT BRIEF BY

Latest fact briefs

About fact briefs published on Gigafact

Fact briefs are short, credibly sourced summaries that offer “yes/no” answers in response to claims found online. They rely on publicly available, often primary source data and documents. Fact briefs are created by contributors to Gigafact —a nonprofit project looking to expand participation in fact-checking and protect the democratic process. See all fact briefs here.