The Covid-19 pandemic has occurred amid heightened focus on economic and racial inequality in the U.S. As the Biden administration seeks a large Covid stimulus relief package, the everyday financial needs and stresses are greatest based on race, ethnicity and gender.
Forty percent of Latinos and half of Blacks are counting on another round of government financial assistance just to “get by” versus only 22 percent of white respondents who feel that level of financial anxiety, according to a new CNBC + Acorns Invest in You survey conducted by SurveyMonkey. Thirty-one percent of Asian-Americans said they were counting on stimulus relief payment.
Twenty percent of white respondents taking the survey said they don’t need stimulus checks, and that the government should give the money to someone else who needs it. That’s roughly twice the percentage of Blacks and Latinos who answered similarly.
Meanwhile, those who need the Covid financial assistance the most are less likely to receive it promptly. Though more than three-quarters (76 percent) of whites say they’ve received at least one Covid-19 aid payment from the government, only 67 percent of Hispanics and 65 percent of Blacks say they received the funds, according to the survey, which was conducted between Feb. 1 and Feb. 8 among more than 6,100 Americans. Among Asian-Americans respondents, 61 percent said they received payments.
Louis Barajas, CFP, a member of the CNBC Financial Advisor Council says the data on payment receipt may be explained by lower reliance on direct deposit by Latinos.
“Checks are likelier to get lost in the mail, so if you don’t have a bank account for direct deposit, then it’s easier to miss your stimulus payment,” says Barajas.
Emergencies and everyday expenses
The survey underscores the disparate day-to-day impact of the coronavirus pandemic by race and gender.
A plurality of survey respondents spent the stimulus payment on everyday expenses (31 percent), but a higher proportion of Latinos and Blacks spent it on rent or mortgage payments compared to whites. Among Latinos, 27 percent spent it on housing payments, the highest proportion of any group in the survey. Twenty-six percent of Black respondents indicated spending a stimulus payment on housing, versus 12 percent of whites.
The differences in access to liquid savings are also apparent: While 58 percent of whites would access their savings account if they needed $2,000 in an emergency, only 38 percent of Hispanics surveyed would do the same. Meanwhile, 14 percent of Latinos — the highest proportion of any group — responded that they would borrow it from a friend or relative, highlighting, perhaps a savings or traditional banking gap between racial groups.