A Wider Wage Gap Means More African-American Deaths, but Not White Ones

The income gap between the rich and the poor is known to affect mortality, and a new study reveals that there is also a racial component. Researchers from the University of California at Berkeley have examined the association of income inequality with the number of deaths in white and African-American communities. For African Americans, the number of deaths go hand-in-hand with the extent of income inequality; for white Americans, the trend is reversed.

“Income inequality matters for everyone, but it matters differently for different groups of people.” says Amani Nuru-Jeter, associate professor at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health and an author of the study. There have been a number of studies that link wage gaps to health disparities, but they usually examine the American population as a whole, says Nuru-Jeter. What this study has done differently is factor in race.