NATURAL CAPITAL

Scientists conceptualize a species 'stock market' to put a price tag on actions posing risks to biodiversity

by Pensoft Publishers

A fungal example of a digital species with rich metadata on systematics, ecology, DNA data, and collection localities. Credit: Dr Kessy Abarenkov

So far, science has described more than 2 million species, and millions more await discovery. While species have value in themselves, many also deliver important ecosystem services to humanity, such as insects that pollinate our crops.

Meanwhile, as we lack a standardized system to quantify the value of different species, it is too easy to jump to the conclusion that they are practically worthless. As a result, humanity has been quick to justify actions that diminish populations and even imperil biodiversity at large.

In a study, published in the scholarly open-science journal Research Ideas and Outcomes, a team of Estonian and Swedish scientists propose to formalize the value of all species through a conceptual species 'stock market' (SSM). Much like the regular stock market, the SSM is to act as a unified basis for instantaneous valuation of all items in its holdings.

However, other aspects of the SSM would be starkly different from the regular stock market. Ownership, transactions, and trading will take new forms. Indeed, species have no owners, and 'trade' would not be about transfer of ownership rights among shareholders. Instead, the concept of 'selling' would comprise processes that erase species from some specific area—such as war, deforestation, or pollution.

"The SSM would be able to put a price tag on such transactions, and the price could be thought of as an invoice that the seller needs to settle in some way that benefits global biodiversity," explains the study's lead author Prof. Urmas Kõljalg (University of Tartu, Estonia).

Conversely, taking some action that benefits biodiversity—as estimated through individuals of species—would be akin to buying on the species stock market. Buying, too, has a price tag on it, but this price should probably be thought of in goodwill terms. Here, 'money' represents an investment towards increased biodiversity.

"By rooting such actions in a unified valuation system it is hoped that goodwill actions will become increasingly difficult to dodge and dismiss," adds Kõljalg.

Interestingly, the SSM revolves around the notion of digital species. These are representations of described and undescribed species concluded to exist based on DNA sequences and elaborated by including all we know about their habitat, ecology, distribution, interactions with other species, and functional traits.

For the SSM to function as described, those DNA sequences and metadata need to be sourced from global scientific and societal resources, including natural history collections, sequence databases, and life science data portals. Digital species might be managed further by incorporating data records of non-sequenced individuals, notably observations, older material in collections, and data from publications.

The study proposes that the SSM is orchestrated by the international associations of taxonomists and economists.

"Non-trivial complications are foreseen when implementing the SSM in practice, but we argue that the most realistic and tangible way out of the looming biodiversity crisis is to put a price tag on species and thereby a cost to actions that compromise them," says Kõljalg.

"No human being will make direct monetary profit out of the SSM, and yet it's all Earth's inhabitants—including humans—that could benefit from its pointers."

Newly described species have higher extinction risk

More information: Urmas Kõljalg et al, A price tag on species, Research Ideas and Outcomes (2022). DOI: 10.3897/rio.8.e86741

Provided by Pensoft Publishers 

UN Sustainable Development Goals are influencing narrative, not policy

by Nature Publishing Group

UN Sustainable Development Goals. Credit: UN. https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have influenced governments' narratives around sustainability, but have not led to substantial changes in legislative action and resource allocation decisions, according to a paper published in Nature Sustainability. These findings suggest that the SDGs have had a limited political impact, and that policymakers will need to take much bolder steps to enable transformation.

Plenty of research has explored the breadth of the 17 SDGs, along with the accompanying 169 specific targets, ratified in 2015. However, less is known about whether the SDGs have led to any tangible change—at the global, national and local levels—in policy decisions addressing issues such as poverty eradication, environmental protection and social justice.

Frank Biermann and colleagues analyzed more than 3,000 studies investigating the political impacts of the SDGs between 2016 and 2021. In order to define a transformative impact on a political system, the authors looked for evidence of three types of political change in response to the SDGs. These were changes in political debates, adjustments in laws, regulations and policies, and the creation of new departments, committees or programs, or alternatively the realignment of existing institutions. Sustainability debates in countries have changed since 2015, with the SDGs facilitating some mutual learning among governments concerning sustainable development policies. However, overall, the authors point to only isolated evidence of more stringent policies, institutional realignment, funding reallocation, and the establishment of new laws and programs as a result of the SDGs.

The authors conclude that as the SDGs are not legally binding, policymakers seem to be using them for their own purposes, through either specific interpretation or selective implementation. They go on to state that the framework is proving unable to drive global sustainability policy and the fundamental changes that are needed for its ambitions to be fulfilled.

The Netherlands is not on course to achieve the SDGs

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More information: Frank Biermann et al, Scientific evidence on the political impact of the Sustainable Development Goals, Nature Sustainability (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41893-022-00909-5

Journal information: Nature Sustainability 

Provided by Nature Publishing Group 

Science coverage of climate change can change minds—briefly

by The Ohio State University

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Science reporting on climate change does lead Americans to adopt more accurate beliefs and support government action on the issue—but these gains are fragile, a new study suggests.

Researchers found that these accurate beliefs fade quickly and can erode when people are exposed to coverage skeptical of climate change.

"It is not the case that the American public does not respond to scientifically informed reporting when they are exposed to it," said Thomas Wood, associate professor of political science at The Ohio State University.

"But even factually accurate science reporting recedes from people's frame of reference very quickly."

The study will be published June 24, 2022 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Wood conducted the study with Brendan Nyhan of Dartmouth College and Ethan Porter of George Washington University.

Results showed that accurate science reporting didn't persuade only Democrats—Republicans and people who initially rejected human-caused climate change also had their opinions shifted by reading accurate articles.

The study involved 2,898 online participants who participated in four waves of the experiment during the fall of 2020.

In the first wave, they all read authentic articles in the popular media that provided information reflecting the scientific consensus on climate change.

In the second and third waves of the experiment, they read either another scientific article, an opinion article that was skeptical of climate science, an article that discussed the partisan debate over climate change, or an article on an unrelated subject.

In the fourth wave, the participants simply were asked their beliefs about the science of climate change and their policy attitudes.

To rate participants' scientific understanding, the researchers asked after each wave if they believed (correctly) that climate change is happening and has a human cause. To measure their attitudes, researchers asked participants if they favored government action on climate change and if they favored renewable energy.

Wood said it was significant that accurate reporting had positive effects on all groups, including Republicans and those who originally rejected climate change. But it was even more encouraging that it affected attitudes.

"Not only did science reporting change people's factual understanding, it also moved their political preferences," he said.

"It made them think that climate change was a pressing government concern that government should do more about."

But the positive effects on people's beliefs were short-lived, results showed. These effects largely disappeared in later waves of the study.

In addition, opinion stories that were skeptical of the scientific consensus on climate change reversed the accuracy gains generated by science coverage.

Articles featuring partisan conflict had no measurable effects on people's beliefs and attitudes.

Overall, the results suggest that the media play a key role in Americans' beliefs and attitudes about scientific issues like climate change.

"It was striking to us how amenable the subjects in our study were to what they read about climate change in our study. But what they learned faded very quickly," Wood said.

The results of the study conflict with the media imperative to only report on what is new.

"What we found suggests that people need to hear the same accurate messages about climate change again and again. If they only hear it once, it recedes very quickly," Wood said.

"The news media isn't designed to act that way."Explaining scientific consensus may help to convince naysayers

More information: Time and skeptical opinion content erode the effects of science coverage on climate beliefs and attitudes, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2122069119.

Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 

Provided by The Ohio State University 

Eating Red Meat Associated With an Increased Risk of Death

By LOMA LINDA UNIVERSITY 

ADVENTIST*** HEALTH SCIENCES CENTER 

JUNE 19, 2022


Researchers found an 8% increase in the mortality risk associated with eating moderate amounts of red meat

Researchers suggest limiting the consumption of ultra-processed meals and red meat to increase longevity

According to experts at Loma Linda University Health, high intake of ultra-processed foods and, separately, excessive consumption of red meat may be important mortality indicators. Their newly published research adds to the expanding body of knowledge regarding the effects of ultra-processed meals and red meat on human health and lifespan.

In comparison to previous research on the health effects of ultra-processed and animal-based diets, this study has one of the biggest cohorts, with over 77,000 individuals. It also took into account a wide range of diets, including vegetarian and non-vegetarian options. According to Gary Fraser, MBChB, Ph.D., a study author and professor at Loma Linda University School of Medicine and School of Public Health, the findings gave fresh insights regarding ultra-processed foods as a common denominator of mortality between vegetarians and non-vegetarians.

“Our study addresses the question of what can make a vegetarian diet healthy or unhealthy,” Fraser says. “It seems that the proportion of ultra-processed foods in someone’s diet is actually more important with respect to mortality than the proportion of animal-derived foods they eat, the exception being red meat.”

Fraser says the study exposes how it is possible to be a “bad vegetarian or a good non-vegetarian” because it isolates the health impacts of processed foods in the diet — whether it’s vegetarian or not. Results revealed that vegetarians who ate a lot of processed foods as part of their diets faced a similar proportionate increase in mortality outcomes as non-vegetarians who ate a lot of processed foods in their diets.

The study, “Ultra-processed food intake and animal-based food intake and mortality in the Adventist health study-2,” published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, assesses the mortality risks of two dietary factors independent of each other:
the proportion of the diet composed of ultra-processed foods as opposed to less processed foods; examples of ultra-processed foods include soft drinks, certain meat analogs, and candy.
the proportion of the diet from animal-based foods (meats, eggs, and dairy) as opposed to plant-based foods.

Seven LLU researchers gathered data from an observational prospective cohort study in North America, recruited from Seventh-day Adventist churches, comprising of 77,437 female and male participants. Participants completed a frequency food questionnaire including over 200 food items to describe their diets. They also provided other health-related and demographic information about themselves, including sex, race, geographic region, education, marital status, rate of tobacco and alcohol use, exercise, sleep, BMI, and comorbid conditions with cardiovascular disease or diabetes.

Researchers then analyzed participants’ health and demographic information in conjunction with their mortality data, provided by the National Death Index, for a mean timeframe of about seven and a half years. Next, researchers used a statistical model to help them consider each variable independently of others and produce a cause-specific mortality analysis.

They adjusted their statistical model to focus on ultra-processed food intake irrespective of other factors like animal-food consumption or age. In doing so, Fraser and co-authors found that people who obtained half of their total calories from ultra-processed foods faced a 14% increase in mortality compared to people who received only 12.5% of their total calories from ultra-processed foods.

Study authors report that high consumption levels of ultra-processed foods were associated with mortality related to respiratory, neurologic, and renal conditions — particularly Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (even when restricted to people who never smoked). However, high ultra-processed food consumption was not associated with mortality from cardiovascular disease, cancer, or endocrine conditions.

Results did not reveal an association between mortality and dietary intake of total animal-based foods. Once researchers parsed animal-based foods into sub-categories, however, they found a statistically significant 8% increase in the mortality risk associated with moderate (approximately 1 ½ oz per day) consumption of red meat compared to no red meat.

Overall, Fraser says the study demonstrated how greater consumption of ultra-processed foods was associated with higher all-cause mortality, even in a health-conscious Adventist population with many vegetarians. Such findings of ultra-processed food consumption and mortality provide a “helpful confirmation of what people expected,” he says.

The study calls for further research into the specific health effects of ultra-processed food consumption in humans. While research endeavors continue to deepen understanding of how ultra-processed foods impact our health, Fraser advises avoiding consuming them at high levels.

“If you’re interested in living longer or to your maximal potential, you’d be wise to avoid a diet filled with ultra-processed foods and replace them with less processed or unprocessed foods,” Fraser says. “At the same time, avoid eating a lot of red meat. It’s as simple as that.”

Reference: “Ultra-processed food intake and animal-based food intake and mortality in the Adventist Health Study-2” by Michael J Orlich, Joan Sabaté, Andrew Mashchak, Ujué Fresán, Karen Jaceldo-Siegl, Fayth Miles and Gary E Fraser, 24 February 2022, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
DOI: 10.1093/ajcn/nqac043

*** SEVENTH DAY ADVENTISTS ARE CHRISTIAN VEGETARIANS

RENT = INFLATION

Low-income renters can't afford rent in nearly 45% of America's largest metro areas

by Margaret Crable, University of Southern California

Low-income residents may be forced to live in neighborhoods plagued by pollution and

 crime, and lacking quality schools. Credit: Unsplash

Metro areas in the United States have become increasingly unaffordable to residents, especially Black and Latino Americans, finds a new report from the USC Dornsife Equity Research Institute (ERI), published by the National Equity Atlas.

Between 2013 and 2019, the number of metro areas having no zip codes with housing that is affordable to working class renters increased from 14% to 42%. More than 80% of the country's most populous regions saw an average 12% drop in affordability. ERI co-produced the report with nonprofit PolicyLink.

Without access to options, low-income households are forced to live in neighborhoods plagued by pollution and high-crime, and with few amenities such as quality schools or parks. For low-income families squeezed out of resource-rich neighborhoods, their children face an uphill battle when breaking out of poverty.

It's also a concern for businesses. With less and less affordable housing in metro areas, companies struggle to find and retain workers. Already, employers are attempting to mitigate the problem by purchasing and building affordable housing for their workers, with mixed results.

Renters across income brackets and race/ethnicities face a shrinking number of affordable neighborhoods

• Since 2013, the number of neighborhoods with affordable housing for low-, median- and moderate-income families have declined across 100 of the largest metro areas in the U.S.
• For Black, Latino and white households, affordability decreased in more metro areas than it increased.
• The number of metro areas with zero affordable neighborhoods for low-income renters tripled.
• Just three metro areas saw an increase in affordability for low-income renters: Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Madison, Wisconsin; and Wichita, Kansas.

Differences in median-income worsened neighborhood choices for Black and Latino families

• From 2013 to 2019, median income for Black households increased less than for Latino and white households. Controlling for inflation, median household income for Black residents increased by $800 compared to $3,000 for whites and $3,700 for Latinos.
• Only 7% of neighborhoods are affordable to median-income Black households, and 16% to median-income Latino families. In contrast, median-income white households could afford nearly 70% of available rental areas.

The neighborhoods that remain affordable are low-opportunity, especially for Black households

• Of the neighborhoods that are still affordable for low-income households, over 75% rank "low" or "very-low" on the Child Opportunity Index (COI). COI measures and maps neighborhood resources and conditions, like safe streets and parks, considered important to healthy child development. For Black families, this rises to over 80% of affordable neighborhoods.
• Only 6% of neighborhoods affordable to median-income Black families are ranked as "high-opportunity" and none are ranked as "very-high opportunity."

"Housing unaffordability is both a product and driver of racial inequities, and it's only getting worse. Working class Black and Latinx households continue to experience de facto segregation as they are unjustly priced out from high-opportunity areas that would improve their lives and generations to come," says Thai V. Le, Turpanjian Postdoctoral Fellow in Civil Society and Social Change at the Equity Research Institute and a co-author of the report.

"However, as important as it is to bring affordable housing to opportunity-rich neighborhoods, we must also bring opportunities and resources to working-class neighborhoods where community ties are."

The report recommends a variety of potential solutions to improve conditions.

• Expand and make permanent many of the eviction protections that urban areas enacted during the pandemic.
• Preserve existing affordable housing units, and increase community ownership models like community land trusts which guarantee housing with lasting affordability.
• Implement inclusionary zoning, in which developers set aside a small amount of newly constructed units for low-income renters.
• Improve the quality of existing affordable neighborhoods by cleaning up polluted areas and building parks and infrastructure.

U.S. rent has increased 175% faster than household income over past 20 years

Provided by University of Southern California 

THIRD WORLD USA

Study finds that public housing residents experience higher levels of air pollution

by University of Texas at El Paso

Residents of public housing throughout the United States experience higher levels of air 

pollution, according to an inter-institutional study led by a researcher from The University

 of Texas at El Paso that appeared in Scientific Reports, one of Nature's portfolio

 of journals. Credit: Jayajit Chakraborty.

Residents of public housing throughout the United States experience higher levels of air pollution, according to an inter-institutional study led by a researcher from The University of Texas at El Paso that appeared in Scientific Reports.

Jayajit Chakraborty, Ph.D., a professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, said the article, "Air pollution exposure disparities in US public housing developments" is the first national-scale study that demonstrated the exposure disparities of fine particulate matter on residents in public housing across the country.

Chakraborty, founding director of UTEP's Socio-Environmental and Geospatial Analysis (SEGA) Lab, has studied social inequalities in the distribution of environmental pollution and health hazards for more than 20 years. He said previous research had not examined if public housing developments were located in areas that experienced higher outdoor air pollution. A high percentage of the nation's public housing residents include minorities, the elderly, people with disabilities or pre-existing health conditions, and others who do not have the resources to address environmental pollution.

The UTEP researcher said that the study showed that public housing in the U.S. is significantly overrepresented in neighborhoods with greater outdoor particulate matter, an inhalable mixture of tiny solids and/or liquid droplets made of various chemicals that are about 3% of the diameter of a human hair. He said their research also found that public housing with high levels of particulate matter had a significantly higher percentage of residents who were Black, Hispanic, disabled and/or extremely low income.

"These findings represent an important starting point for future research and emphasize the urgent need to identify gaps in environmental, public health and housing policies that have contributed to higher air pollution exposures among public housing residents," Chakraborty said.

The UTEP researcher worked with longtime collaborators from the University of Utah, Timothy W. Collins, Ph.D., professor of geology, and Sara E. Grineski, Ph.D., professor of sociology and environmental studies. Both worked at UTEP from 2006 through 2017. The other team member was Jacob J. Aun, a UTEP graduate student in sociology. The team started to collect the data in July 2021, completed the analysis in January 2022, wrote the article this past spring and submitted it to Scientific Reports in April 2022.

Residents of public housing throughout the United States experience higher levels of air

 pollution, according to an inter-institutional study led by a researcher from The University

 of Texas at El Paso that appeared in Scientific Reports, one of Nature's portfolio of

 journals. Credit: Jayajit Chakraborty.

Collins said that exposure to particulate matter can severely affect human health. He said outdoor exposure is responsible for 3% of all deaths and 22% of deaths from environmental causes nationwide.

"Our study is especially relevant today given the fact that the U.S. faces a severe housing crisis, as affordable housing construction has not accommodated a growing financially insecure population," Collins said. "Access to safe shelter is a basic need that remains unmet for many."

Grineski said that she has been concerned with the effects of air pollution on public housing residents for more than 15 years.

"I was excited to pursue this study with Dr. Chakraborty to quantitatively assess this issue at a nationwide scale," Grineski said. "Public housing is an incredibly important and needed public good in the U.S. We need to do better though in terms of improving environmental quality for residents."

Chakraborty said the next step in this research is to investigate the relationship between public housing developments and pollution sources such as Superfund sites and industrial manufacturing facilities. He also wants to investigate how natural disasters affect public housing residents.

"I hope this article will reach a large number of readers and draw attention to environmental problems faced by public housing residents in the U.S.," Chakraborty said

Aun, the student researcher, said that he was excited to have been part of the team. He helped with data downloads and analysis, and helped Chakraborty to edit the article.

"It was a great learning experience," Aun said. "I am very proud of the work that we accomplished and how it contributes to identifying social disparities in air pollution exposure."Puerto Rico to install free internet in all public housing

More information: Jayajit Chakraborty et al, Air pollution exposure disparities in US public housing developments, Scientific Reports (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-13942-

Journal information: Scientific Reports 

Provided by University of Texas at El Paso 

RENTIER CAPITALI$M

How stock market inefficiencies can affect the real economy

by University of Luxembourg

How the dynamic flow-based investment strategy outperforms the market portfolio. 

Credit: The author

Mutual fund investors are known to be vulnerable to fluctuating market conditions. What is less well understood is how corporate managers are affected by waves of investor optimism. A researcher has published a study in the journal Financial Innovation, where he argues that corporate managers and investors are jointly caught up in market euphoria. Using a long time series of aggregate flows in and out of bond and equity mutual funds as a proxy for investor sentiment, the study's author, Thorsten Lehnert, professor at the University of Luxembourg's Department of Finance shows that the joint "moodiness" of managers and investors can predict the performance of an investment strategy that relies on differences in corporate managers' investment behavior.

Prof. Lehnert focused on the so-called investment factor, an investment strategies that is long in a conservative investment portfolio and short in an aggressive investment portfolio. He explains that "stock prices of high- and low-investment firms are differentially affected by market-level euphoria. For example, the observed mispricing during periods of euphoria and the subsequent correction is particularly pronounced for a high investment portfolio compared to a low investment portfolio. As a result, the performance of an investment factor can be predicted using information about retail investors' optimism and pessimism."

Interestingly, the relationship between past flows and the investment factor is not only statistically significant, but also economically significant. The study shows that, overall, a related trading strategy consistently and significantly outperforms static strategies and generates significant annual alphas of 7% after accounting for well-known risk factors. Interestingly, the flow measure, which serves as a proxy for market-level euphoria, dominates other well-known indicators of investor sentiment.

"So far, the common view is that retail investors are 'moody' and exhibit irrational trading behavior. My explanation that corporate managers and investors are jointly caught up in market euphoria offers a novel perspective on how financial markets can affect the real economy," Prof. Lehnert explains. "It appears that stock market inefficiencies matter even for real decisions of firms," he concludes.Price noise proves the key to high performing 'bets against beta' investment strategies

More information: Thorsten Lehnert, Corporate managers, price noise and the investment factor, Financial Innovation (2022). DOI: 10.1186/s40854-022-00365-2

Provided by University of Luxembourg 

Spanish citizens are more supportive of climate action after COVID-19, but more pessimistic in their expectations

by Autonomous University of Barcelona

Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Most of the Spanish population is pessimistic about the future climate actions by the government and citizens after the impact of COVID-19. This is the conclusion of a study carried out by researchers at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autònoma of Barcelona (ICTA-UAB), which seeks to determine how the COVID-19 crisis has affected society's attitude toward climate change.

Over the past two years, speculations about how COVID-19 will affect climate action have abounded. While the most optimistic voices point to a favorable change in individuals' behavior towards the environment, the more critical voices point out that environmental concerns have taken a back seat to economic recovery programs.

A team of ICTA-UAB researchers led by economist Jeroen van den Bergh has analyzed public expectations about future climate action using textual responses obtained from an online survey and analyzing them with methods from computational linguistics. The results of the study, recently published in the journal PLoS ONE, indicate that people have more negative than positive expectations about how the pandemic will affect both the government policies and citizen action on climate change.

The majority of identified public opinions regarding governmental action reflect negative perceptions. In general, they relate to reduced attention given to climate change, to budgetary constraints due to COVID-19 and the associated economic and health crises, as well as to an increase of waste due to the use of disposable protective measures such as masks and gloves. A small number of people (8.2%) see little to no connection between COVID-19 and climate action. Only two topics covering about 15% of responses are of a more positive nature: they consider COVID-19 an environmental wake-up call or point at positive changes in consumption habits and telework.

Regarding people's expectations of the actions of their fellow citizens, around 31% of respondents have positive opinions on the situation and believe that COVID-19 has led to higher environmental awareness and more responsible consumption. Nevertheless, most respondents still express negative views, suggesting for example that people have already too many other problems to be concerned about climate action or will shift quickly back to old routines once the pandemic is over.

According to researchers, additional findings emerge through measuring positive and negative expectations. "We found that expectations of future climate actions by the government and the people tend to strongly correlate. Also, those most optimistic about future climate action tend to be younger, male, better educated, with a stronger perception of climate change as a serious threat and a more positive experience with COVID-19 confinement," explains Ivan Savin, ICTA-UAB researcher and lead author of the study.

These generally pessimistic expectations contrast with the findings of a complementary study, recently published in the journal Ecological Economics, by the same group of researchers. This second study, led by ICTA-UAB researcher Stefan Drews, analyzed how citizens' engagement with climate change has changed over time. For this, they compared survey data of the same group of respondents from months before and after COVID-19. They found that public support for climate policy tended to be slightly higher after COVID-19. Even respondents who had negative health or economic experiences due to COVID-19 were not less supportive of climate policy. "This suggests that public expectations about other citizens (shown in the first study) may be more negative than current reality since (as the second study demonstrates) positive changes in public opinion have taken place," Stefan Drews says.

The scientists suggest that policymakers could exploit this perceived link between COVID-19 and the environmental crisis to introduce more ambitious climate policy measures. Thus, understanding people's expectations is important for policy makers to propose policy instruments which are not only effective but also supported by majority of the population.

Australians intend to vote on climate action at election

More information: Ivan Savin et al, Public expectations about the impact of COVID-19 on climate action by citizens and government, PLOS ONE (2022). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.026697

Journal information: PLoS ONE 

Provided by Autonomous University of Barcelona 

REAL CRITICAL RACE THEORY

How historical racism influences modern poverty and racial inequality

by Michele W. Berger, University of Pennsylvania

Penn sociologist Regina Baker. Credit: University of Pennsylvania

To understand modern racial inequalities, historical context is crucial. That's according to new research from Penn sociologist Regina Baker published in the American Journal of Sociology.

Baker found that in Southern states with a strong historical racial regime—a notion she conceptualized and then measured using a scale she created—Black populations today experience worse poverty. These states also have a wider poverty gap between Black and white populations.

"In general, Black people are more likely to be poor than white people," says Baker, an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology. "Living in a state that has a stronger historical racial context exacerbates that poverty."

'I was meant to dig deeper'

Baker grew up in Georgia, and both her parents came from South Carolina. "The South has always been of interest to me," she says. In graduate school, she knew she wanted to research poverty and inequality, but she didn't home in on what would eventually become this research until one particular news article got her thinking.

The piece ranked states in many categories, from poverty to child well-being and health care. "For nearly every category, so many of the states at the bottom were in the South," she says.

She wondered why, yet looking through the previous literature got her nowhere; little sociological research existed on poverty in the contemporary South. She happened upon a paper from respected sociologist Ronald C. Wimberley making a plea to colleagues to do more research about the South and to use their expertise to better understand social problems like impoverishment through a Southern lens.

"Here I am reading this article. I had all these questions in my mind about why the Southern states were coming up in indicators as being worse off. There was this call for work on the South and for sociologists from the South to do more of this work. It just seemed like I was meant to dig deeper," Baker says. "That's what really got me interested in focusing on this topic specifically."

Building an empirical study

Given the dearth of previous research, Baker opted to take a novel approach, conceptualizing and constructing a measure of what she called the "historical racial regime," or HRR. It built on the commonly held sociological notion of the "U.S. racial regime," which Baker describes in the paper as "a system of rule based on race that essentially functions to sustain racial inequality."

The HRR concept went a step beyond. In particular, Baker developed the HRR scale to measure past manifestations of the U.S. racial regime across time. She incorporated various historical state-facilitated institutions that shaped the lives of people who lived there, starting with slavery.

"Slavery itself is one institution, a crucial one, but there are also others that states put into place, mechanisms of inequality that contributed to racial inequality," Baker says. Here, she mentions facets of Jim Crow like sharecropping, disenfranchisement, and segregation. Using historical state-level data around each of these, plus slavery, she built the HRR scale.

"Scholars have said that history matters but rarely test it or show it," she says. "For instance, they may theorize about the role of racism in America or about white supremacy in racial inequality, but then they're not able to test it." Baker decided to change that.

Because Southern states vary in their level of such institutional state mechanisms—which could have implications for their legacy and racial inequality in poverty—Baker set out to assess the relationship between HRR, poverty, and racial inequality in poverty in the contemporary American South.

She incorporated 15 states into her study: Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia. For each, she tabulated a score using the HRR scale.

To ensure she was focused on modern-day poverty, she selected the time frame from 2010 to 2018. Then she looked at U.S. Census Current Population Survey data for more than 525,000 individuals from the Luxembourg Income Study database. From there, she plotted poverty data and HRR data together to examine the relationship between a state's HRR score, poverty levels, and gaps for people living there today.

What she found, and the implications

Baker says she noticed a link almost immediately. "Plotting those data was telling in and of itself, suggesting there's an association there," she says. "This historical manifestation of a racial regime seemed to matter much more for Black people than white people and especially for the poverty gap between them."

Further, more advanced statistical analysis confirmed the preliminary findings, even after accounting for several individual-level variables like family structure, employment status, and education level. "After controlling for those, some that plausibly mediate the relationship between HRR and poverty, I still found this significance of HRR, where the likelihood of poverty for Black people today and Black-white inequalities in poverty are exacerbated," Baker says.

These results challenge the enduring racial inequality narrative "that it's all about the individual, especially family structure and single motherhood," she says. They also suggest that the steps previously taken to ameliorate poverty that focus primarily on the individual aren't very effective; if they had been, she says, this racial inequality would not endure.

In the future, Baker says she hopes to use the HRR concept to understand the role of historical racism for other outcomes, as well as broaden it to other populations and parts of the country. Ultimately, she envisions such information could help reshape how the United States confronts poverty and racial inequality.

"We can't fully understand the context of modern-day poverty or inequality if we don't consider the role that history played. We can't act like the past doesn't matter if we want to move forward," Baker says. "We can't just think about the individual in a vacuum; we must think about the broader context in which individuals live, not just the micro but also the macro and how they help inform each other. Only then can we think more purposefully and creatively to address these enduring issues."Few Americans see race as key factor in environmental inequality

More information: Regina S. Baker, The Historical Racial Regime and Racial Inequality in Poverty in the American South, American Journal of Sociology (2022). DOI: 10.1086/719653

Journal information: American Journal of Sociology 

Provided by University of Pennsylvania