The Samuel DuBois Cook Center is a scholarly collaborative that studies the causes and consequences of inequality and develops remedies for these disparities and their adverse effects.
Cook Center Founding Director William A. “Sandy” Darity, Jr., along with writer A. Kirsten Mullen, were recently interviewed by WUNC North Carolina Public Radio to discuss research from their edited volume The Black Reparations Project: A Handbook for Racial Justice. This research demonstrates a direct connection between slavery and today’s racial wealth gap. In the audio…
Dr. Darity was quoted in the Richmond Free Press about the failure of Reconstruction to provide freedmen and freedwomen with land following the Civil War. “There would’ve been a territory ranging from the Sea Islands to northern Florida that would’ve been essentially a coastal Black belt community,” he said. Instead, he noted, Black Americans remained…
While many Black Americans have been celebrating Juneteenth since 1865, the holiday has often been overlooked by non-Black Americans. This hour, we look at the tradition of the holiday and recognize its importance as a time to learn more about Black history in the U.S. Alliah L. Agostini is a mom and children’s book author. Her…
Faculty Affiliate Carliss Chatman, Professor at SMU Dedman School of Law, was quoted in a story by Marketplace examining how companies are quietly rebranding diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. The article explores how some corporations are scaling back or reframing public-facing DEI language amid political scrutiny. And, that the broader landscape is more nuanced…
February 20, 2026 — A new first-of-its-kind study of nearly 3,000 adults in New York City finds significant inequities in wealth and health outcomes across the 11 most common racial and ethnic groups, showing that Black and Latino New Yorkers have less wealth and unfairly worse health outcomes compared to others. Conducted in June 2024 by…
Faculty Affiliate Omer Ali is an Assistant Professor of economics at the University of Pittsburgh, and previous postdoctoral fellow a the Cook Center. Ali is the lead researcher on a new article published in Regional Science and Urban Economics this month examining the relationship between race and home values in Durham, North Carolina. The study…
