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Mortgage Lending to Minorities: Where's the Bias?

Author

Listed:
  • Day, Theodore E
  • Liebowitz, S J

Abstract

This paper examines mortgage lending and concludes that studies based on data created by the Boston Fed should be reevaluated. A detailed examination of these data indicates that irregularities in these data, when combined with the most commonly used research methodology, appear to have biased previous research toward a finding of discrimination against minority applicants. When the most severe data irregularities are eliminated, evidence to support a hypothesis of discrimination disappears. The currently fashionable 'flexible' underwriting standards of mortgage lenders may have the unintended consequences of increasing defaults for the 'beneficiaries' of these policies. Copyright 1998 by Oxford University Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Day, Theodore E & Liebowitz, S J, 1998. "Mortgage Lending to Minorities: Where's the Bias?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(1), pages 3-28, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:ecinqu:v:36:y:1998:i:1:p:3-28
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Block, Walter & Snow, Nicholas & Stringham, Edward, 2008. "Banks, insurance companies, and discrimination," MPRA Paper 26035, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Judith Clarke & Nilanjana Roy & Marsha Courchane, 2009. "On the robustness of racial discrimination findings in mortgage lending studies," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(18), pages 2279-2297.
    3. Stanley D. Longhofer & Stephen R. Peters, 1998. "Self-selection and discrimination in credit markets," Working Papers (Old Series) 9809, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    4. Massimo FLORIO, 2012. "The real roots of the great recession: unsustainable income distribution," Departmental Working Papers 2012-01, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    5. Cullen Goenner, 2010. "Discrimination and Mortgage Lending in Boston: The Effects of Model Uncertainty," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 40(3), pages 260-285, April.
    6. Paul S. Calem & Stanley D. Longhofer, 2000. "Anatomy of a fair-lending exam: the uses and limitations of statistics," Working Papers (Old Series) 0003R, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    7. Yan Zhang, 2013. "Fair Lending Analysis of Mortgage Pricing: Does Underwriting Matter?," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 46(1), pages 131-151, January.
    8. Judith Clarke & Marsha Courchane, 2004. "Implications of Stratified Sampling for Fair Lending Binary Logit Models," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 30(1), pages 5-31, October.
    9. David G. Blanchflower & Phillip B. Levine & David J. Zimmerman, 2003. "Discrimination in the Small-Business Credit Market," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(4), pages 930-943, November.
    10. Song Han, 2011. "Creditor Learning and Discrimination in Lending," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer;Western Finance Association, vol. 40(1), pages 1-27, October.
    11. Judith A. Giles & Marsha J. Courchane, 2000. "Stratified Sample Design for Fair Lending Binary Logit Models," Econometrics Working Papers 0007, Department of Economics, University of Victoria.
    12. Stanley D. Longhofer & Stephen R. Peters, 1998. "Beneath the rhetoric: clarifying the debate on mortgage lending discrimination," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, vol. 34(Q IV), pages 2-13.
    13. Dawkins, Mark C., 2002. "Simultaneity bias in mortgage lending: A test of simultaneous equations models on bank-specific data," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 26(8), pages 1593-1613, August.
    14. Jason Dietrich, 2005. "Under-specified Models and Detection of Discrimination: A Case Study of Mortgage Lending," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 31(1), pages 83-105, August.
    15. Ken Cyree & Keith Harvey & Michael Melton, 2004. "Bank Lending to Native American Applicants: An Investigation of Mortgage Flows and Government Guarantee Programs on Native American Lands," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer;Western Finance Association, vol. 26(1), pages 29-54, August.
    16. Paul S. Calem & Stanley D. Longhofer, 2000. "Anatomy of a fair-lending exam: the uses and limitations of statistics," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2000-15, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    17. Sudipta Basu & Justin Vitanza & Wei Wang & Xiaoyu Ross Zhu, 2022. "Walking the walk? Bank ESG disclosures and home mortgage lending," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 27(3), pages 779-821, September.

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