Race and Access to Complete Plumbing Facilities

BASICS INEQUALITY

Race and Access to Complete Plumbing Facilities

in the United States

Stephen P. Gasteyer

Department of Sociology , Michigan State University

Jennifer Lai

Department of Sociology , Michigan State University

Brittany Tucker

Department of Sociology , Michigan State University

Jennifer Carrera

Department of Sociology , Michigan State University

Julius Moss

Department of Sociology , Michigan State University

 

Abstract

In light of 2014–2016 media coverage about the inadequate water and sanitation services

for households in places like Flint and Detroit, Michigan and the Central Valley of California,

this paper asks whether places with majority non-White residents in the United States

disproportionately lack access to these most basic of services. Investigating this issue

through the combined lenses of structural racism, environmental justice, and the human right

to water and sanitation, we analyze U.S. Census American Community Survey household

data at the county level. Our findings indicate strong White versus non-White racial effects

at the national and county levels (R 2 = 0.0462, P < 0.05). When the non-White population

is broken down into racial categories, places with higher percentages of American Indians

and Alaska Native households are significantly associated with lack of access to complete

plumbing facilities. Lacking access to complete plumbing does correlate with lower educational

attainment and higher percentages of unemployment, and less robustly, it also correlates

positively with median household income. The implication is the existence of a pattern of

structural environmental racism in terms of the practical accessibility of water and sanitation

infrastructure. We suspect, however, that the U.S. Census, while considered the most

comprehensive national data source on this issue right now, significantly undercounts those

lacking access to water and sanitation services. We argue that better data will be essential

in order to carry out a more in-depth analysis of water access conditions and to develop

strategies that address this issue of growing importance.

 

 

Keywords: Environmental Justice , Environmental Racism , Structural Racism ,

Human Right to Water and Sanitation , Water and Sanitation , American Indian/Alaska

Natives

 

Du Bois Review, 13:2 (2016) 305– 325 .

© 2016 Hutchins Center for African and African American Research 1742-058X/16 $15.00

doi:10.1017/S1742058X16000242