Kapadia, Reshma. “The High Cost of Inequality.” Barron’s, 2020, pp. 21–26.
Reshma Kapadia examines the effects of income and wealth inequality on the American economy in her book High Cost of Inequality. She provides a thorough analysis of current financial trends in America and how exactly they were influenced by both the pandemic and the economic crisis. “The top 1% of earners now account for a fifth of total income in the U.S., while the bottom half of earners account for just 13% of total income,” according to the data presented by Kapadia (2020) (p. 23). The impact such a gap brings is immense: the market mostly ignores the problem with wealth distribution, further widening the gorge, and the average families experience severe difficulties surviving during the crisis the pandemic brought. Thus, the second part of the essay considers the subsequent problems the stockholders now have to deal with. Overall, the article is supported through and through with statistical evidence, as well as thoughtful consideration of the data the author provides – it appears to be quite unbiased and credible in terms of analysis. The information and conclusions drawn in the article prove to be of high relevance to the current research topic of How Do We Solve Economic Disparity and Injustice – the author offers a solution to the problem, as well as an explanation as to why it is supposed to work.
Yu, Qinggang, et al. “Racial Residential Segregation and Economic Disparity Jointly Exacerbate COVID‐19 Fatality in Large American Cities.” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, vol. 1494, no. 1, 2021, pp. 18–30., doi:10.1111/nyas.14567
The article Racial Residential Segregation and Economic Disparity Jointly Exacerbate COVID‐19 Fatality in Large American Cities by Yu et al. (2021) takes a more specialized approach, exploring specifically the disparities associated with the COVID-19 health crisis. The authors have used statistical data on COVID-19 mortality rates in different racial environments to conduct a full scientific analysis, which makes their study fully credible and reliable. According to their research, “the growth rate of COVID-19 cases and deaths was higher for metropolitan statistical areas that exhibit greater Black–White or Hispanic–White segregation, and the effect was exacerbated by income inequality in the area” (p. 26). This relates directly to the current topic of research, and the article provides the necessary evidence of the first-hand consequences this inequality brings. However, the authors do not provide their audience with their suggestions of a solution to this problem; they merely state and prove the issue. Overall, the article could be useful in the current research as a statistical proof of the income and wealth gap that has been growing in the United States.
The two articles presented in this annotated bibliography do not, in fact, clash in their opinions. Rather, they both agree on the problem of economic disparities taking a drastic rise due to the world health and financial crisis the pandemic brought. However, Kapadia mostly explores the impact of the income gap on the U.S. economy and stock market, additionally diving into the reasons behind that gap, such as racial and class disparities. On the contrary, Yu et al. provide a more in-debt analysis of the racial inequality, and its impact on the COVID-19 mortality rate without actually exploring in detail the economic side of the issue. In terms of credibility and bias, Yu et al.’s research presents as more reliable due to its more scientific approach and the fact that it has been peer-reviewed and posted in an academic journal. Still, both articles have their valid points, as they highlight different aspects of one big problem of inequality that affects the U.S. economy so much today, and both are highly relevant to the current research topic.