The second racial wealth gap.

AuthorJones, Mel

White Millennials can often rely on their parents FOR FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE. FOR MANY BLACK AND Hispanic Millennials it's the other way around.

He died on a Saturday.

My mother and I had planned to pick my dad up from the hospital for a trip to the park. He loved to sit and watch families stroll by as we chatted about oak trees, Kona coffee, and the mysteries of God. This time, the park would miss him.

His skin, smooth and brown like the outside of an avocado seed, glistened with sweat as he struggled to take his last breaths.

In that next year, I graduated from grad school, got a new job, and looked forward to saving for a down payment on my first home, a dream I had always had, but found lofty. I pulled up a blank spreadsheet and made a line item called "House Fund."

That same week I got a call from my mom--she was struggling to pay off my dad's funeral expenses. I looked at my "House Fund" and sighed. Then I deleted it and typed the words "Funeral Fund" instead.

My father's passing was unexpected. And so was the financial burden that came with it.

For many Millennials of color, these sorts of tradeoffs aren't an anomaly. During key times in their lives when they should be building assets, they're spending money on basic necessities and often helping out family. Their financial future is a rocky one, and much of it comes down to how much--or how little--assistance they receive.

A seminal study published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives on wealth accumulation estimates that as much as 20 percent of wealth can be attributed to formal and informal gifts from family members, especially parents. And it starts early. In college, black and Hispanic Millennials are more likely to have to work one or two jobs to get through, missing out on opportunities to connect with classmates who have time to tinker around in dorm rooms and go on to found multibillion-dollar companies together. Many of them take on higher levels of student debt than their white peers, often to pay for routine expenses, like textbooks, that their parents are less likely to subsidize.

"Student debt is the biggest millstone around Millennials, period, and an even larger and heavier one around the necks of black Millennials," said Tom Shapiro, director of the Institute on Assets and Social Policy. "It really hits those doing the right thing. [They're] going through all the hoops." He explained that, unlike in previous decades, when college tuition was drastically lower, the risks of educational costs are now passed down to the individual.

Recent polls indicate that a large portion of Millennials receive financial help from parents. At least 40 percent of the 1,000 Millennials (ages eighteen to thirty-four) polled in a March USA Today/Bank of America poll get help from parents on everyday expenses. A Clark University poll indicated an even higher number, with almost three-quarters of parents reporting that they...

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