Mortgage Lending Risk Maps From the 1930s Influence the Prevalence of Youth Mental Health Problems in the Modern Era.

OBJECTIVE

Historical mortgage lending policies and practices serve as a key foundation of modern-day socioeconomic systems. Few of these structural legacies have been as powerful as those for 20th century mortgage lending risk maps - often referred to as redlining. Although extant studies have identified mental health disparities among residents of formerly redlined neighborhoods, the legacies of greenlined or otherwise positively designated neighborhoods are largely unknown. This represents a key gap in the literature, as efforts to illuminate the historical legacies of these maps must also include the ways in which they may have cemented concentrated advantage and prosperity.

METHOD: The current study sought to fill this gap in a population-based sample of 20,222 children and adolescents in 10,111 families, recruited via birth records into the Michigan State University Twin Registry. We fitted a series of multilevel models to illuminate the full legacy of 20th century mortgage lending risk maps for youth mental health in the 21st century.

RESULTS

Multilevel models indicated that, as expected, youth residing in formerly redlined neighborhoods (those designated as "hazardous") exhibited more symptomatology than youth residing in other types of neighborhoods. However, the most prominent and persistently observed differences were found for youth in formerly greenlined neighborhoods (those designated as "best"), who exhibited substantially better mental health than youth residing in any other type of neighborhood. What's more, the effects of greenlining persisted even when controlling for neighborhood and familial socioeconomic factors, indicating that these variables do not account for the observed effects.

CONCLUSION

Such findings serve to further highlight both the unfair legacies of disadvantage and the entrenched legacies of prosperity wrought by historical mortgage lending risk maps.