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Please note!
This fact brief was originally published as an experiment to test the concepts behind fact briefs.
Readers should be aware that while there is still a lot of useful information in fact briefs like this one, not all of them reflect Gigafact's current methods and standards for fact briefs. If you come across any that you feel are out of date, don't hesitate to contact us at support@gigafact.org.

Does systemic racism against people of color remain an issue in the US?

By Austin Tannenbaum
YES

Cambridge Dictionary defines systemic racism as "policies and practices that exist throughout a whole society or organization, and that result in and support a continued unfair advantage to some people and unfair or harmful treatment of others based on race."

Recent research indicates that non-white people living in the U.S. continue to experience various forms of such society-wide discrimination.

In 2021, economists from the University of California, Berkeley and the University of Chicago found that job applicants with Black-sounding names were called back 10% fewer times than comparable applicants with white-sounding names. 

Also in 2021, the National Bureau of Economic Research published findings that Black and Hispanic rental applicants were respectively 5.6 percentage points and 2.8 percentage points less likely to get a call back than comparable white applicants.

In 2020, NYU researchers found that Black drivers were about 20% more likely to be stopped than white drivers and 1.5 to 2 times more likely to be searched.

In 2017, the United States Sentencing Commission reported that Black males receive prison sentences 20.4% longer than white males for comparable offenses.

In 2022, researchers at the University of Maryland found that Black neighborhoods in Baltimore that were historically denied loans in a discriminatory practice known as redlining were associated with an approximately five-year reduction in life expectancy.

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