The first post of this series found that small businesses owned by people of color are particularly vulnerable to natural disasters. In this post, we focus on the aftermath of disasters, and examine disparities in the ability of firms to reopen their businesses and access disaster relief. Our results indicate that Black-owned firms are more likely to remain closed for longer periods and face greater difficulties in obtaining the immediate relief needed to cope with a natural disaster.| Liberty Street Economics
The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) was designed to reduce household and lender flood-risk exposure and “encourage lending.” In this post, which is based on our related study, we show that in certain situations the program actually limits access to credit, particularly for low-income borrowers—an unintended consequence of this well-intentioned program.| Liberty Street Economics
Asani Sarkar is a financial research advisor in Financial Intermediation. He is working on issues related to credit intermediation by banks and nonbanks, and financial stability of nonbanks and stablecoins. His paper “Stigma in Financial Markets: Evidence from Liquidity Auctions and Discount Window Borrowing During the Crisis” received the Western Finance Association Pearson Award for the best paper on Financial Institutions and Markets in 2011. Dr. Sarkar’s papers have appeared in many...| www.newyorkfed.org
A previous Liberty Street Economics post found that minority-owned small businesses in the Federal Reserve’s Second District have been particularly vulnerable to natural disasters. Here we focus on the aftermath of disasters (such as hurricanes, floods, wildfires, droughts, and winter storms) and examine disparities in the ability of these firms to reopen their businesses and access disaster relief. Our results indicate that while white- and minority-owned firms remain closed for similar du...| Liberty Street Economics