February 24, 2026 / Equity

Black entrepreneurship is strong in Atlanta, yet firm size and payroll trends signal challengesImage

The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) Research & Innovation team revisited its analysis of Black-owned employer businesses in the metro area for February 2026, building on last year’s research and incorporating the latest data from the Census Annual Business Survey (ABS). This analysis spans trends from 2017 to 2023 and compares the Atlanta MSA with national averages and peer Sunbelt metros like Charlotte, Houston, and Miami. By tracking both the number of businesses and their economic footprint, the report highlights where Black entrepreneurship is thriving and where gaps in representation and business scale remain.

Key insights:

  • High ownership share: 10.7% of all employer businesses in metro Atlanta are Black-owned, far above the national average of 3% and leading peer Sunbelt metros (Charlotte 6.5%, Houston 5.9%, Miami 5.4%).

  • Representation gap persists: Black residents make up 34% of the metro population, meaning business ownership still trails population share despite high absolute numbers.

  • Stable business scale: Black-owned firms in Atlanta employ an average of just over 6 people, slightly below the national average, with average annual payroll around $35,500—rising steadily since 2017 but still slightly under the U.S. average.

Read the full post here.

February 24, 2026 / Education, Equity

Connecting students to tailored supports delivers measurable gains from middle school to adulthoodImage

In a publication in December 2025, Opportunity Insights, this study analyzed the impacts of the Communities In Schools (CIS) model, which places site coordinators in high-poverty schools to connect students with personalized academic and non-academic supports such as tutoring, mentoring, food, housing, and health services. Using longitudinal education, Census, and tax data, the paper evaluates how these coordinated supports affect academic outcomes and long-term economic mobility.

Key findings:

    • Personalized supports drive measurable gains: Students connected to tailored services see improvements in test scores, attendance, behavior, and discipline — outcomes that compound over time.

    • Relationships amplify the impact of resources: Having a trusted adult to coordinate services helps students overcome logistical and personal barriers that often limit engagement with school programs.

    • Long-term mobility improves: Multi-year exposure to supports increases high school graduation, college enrollment, and earnings, indicating lasting effects beyond the classroom.

    • Non-cognitive skills matter as much as academics: Improvements in attendance and behavior explain a substantial share of long-run gains, underscoring the importance of whole-student supports.

    • Personalization is efficient at scale: Students receive different mixes of services but achieve similar long-term benefits, suggesting flexible support models can be both effective and scalable.

    • Strong return on investment: Relatively modest per-student costs generate sizable increases in lifetime earnings, making coordinated supports a high-value intervention.

Read the full summary of the publication here.

January 27, 2026 / Equity, Workforce

Burnout, Backslides, and Barriers: Inside Women in the Workplace 2025Image

Lean In published its 2025 Women in the Workplace report. It shows that after years of slow progress, many companies are pulling back on their commitment to women’s advancement. Fewer organizations are prioritizing gender equity, workplace flexibility is shrinking, and women—especially women of color—are facing growing barriers early and late in their careers. Together, these trends risk locking in inequality at every level of the corporate pipeline.

Key insights to know:

  • For the first time, women are less likely than men to say they want a promotion (80% vs. 86%), with the gap especially wide at entry and senior levels—likely reflecting burnout and stalled opportunities, not lack of commitment.

  • Women continue to be promoted to manager at lower rates than men, and disparities are stark for women of color.

  • Six in 10 senior-level women report frequent burnout, and many feel their gender makes advancement harder and job security shakier.

  • Women who work remotely are less likely to be promoted or sponsored, while men see no such penalty. At the same time, companies are rolling back remote and hybrid options at record rates.

  • While most companies still say diversity and inclusion matter, fewer are backing it up with training, resources, or tailored career development.

  • Employees value respectful and fair workplaces, but many entry- and mid-level women still don’t feel supported or comfortable speaking up, meaning organizations are leaving talent on the table.

Read the full report here.

June 27, 2025 / Equity, General

Acceptance Is Up, But LGBTQ Communities Still Report High Rates of DiscriminationImage

June 26, 2025, marks 10 years since the U.S. Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges decision, which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide. A new Pew Research Center survey of nearly 4,000 LGBTQ adults reflects on how much has changed—and what challenges remain.

The survey reveals that support for same-sex marriage has climbed from 31% in 2004 to 63% in 2023, and two-thirds of LGBTQ adults say the Obergefell ruling improved social acceptance—but many still experience discrimination. Nearly 3 in 4 gay or lesbian adults, and 68% of transgender adults, report being targeted by slurs or jokes.

Key findings:

  • Many LGBTQ adults knew their identity early but delayed coming out. Younger adults tend to come out earlier than older ones.
  • People who identify as bisexual are the least likely to have disclosed their identity to family, friends, or coworkers.
  • Gay and lesbian adults report more family support than bisexual or transgender individuals.
  • 42% say their LGBTQ identity is central to who they are, but only 23% feel strongly connected to the broader LGBTQ community.

Read the full report here.

April 28, 2025 / Basic Needs, Equity, Food

Cuts to Federal Funding Could Deepen Poverty in Rural and Low-Income GeorgiaImage

A new analysis from the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute (GBPI) warns that proposed federal budget cuts could severely harm rural communities, low-income families, immigrants, and Georgians of color. Federal programs that help close long-standing gaps in access to health care, education, food, and economic security are now at risk as Congress debates budget reconciliation and appropriations bills ahead of a September 30, 2025 deadline.

Cuts to vital programs like SNAP, education funding, and rural health care are expected to hit hardest in Georgia’s poorest and most vulnerable communities, exacerbating hunger, poverty, and inequality across the state.

Key Takeaways:

  • Georgia ranks 14th in U.S. poverty rates, putting its rural and low-income populations at greater risk if federal funding is slashed.

  • Over 15% of Georgians living in poverty are either Black, Latino, or under 18, meaning federal cuts would disproportionately harm these communities.

  • Programs like SNAP are at risk, threatening food security for thousands of Georgians already living in rural food deserts.

  • Cuts could cost thousands of jobs statewide, particularly in education, health care, and social services sectors.

  • Tracking federal spending impacts is becoming harder, as the administration reduces public data availability, weakening transparency and accountability.

Read the full report here.

February 19, 2025 / Equity

Predatory Lending Disproportionately Targets Black CommunitiesImage

A new report by Kindred Futures reveals the staggering impact of predatory lending and other financial practices, which drain millions from the local economy and disproportionately harm Black Atlantans. The report highlights how addressing this injustice requires bold policy action to curb predatory lending and expand equitable financial opportunities.

Some Key Takeaways:

  • Predatory Lending Disproportionately Targets Black Communities: 67% of Atlanta’s predatory lenders operate in majority-Black neighborhoods, despite these areas comprising a smaller share of the population.
  • Massive Economic Drain: Title loans alone cost Atlanta $128.2 million annually, leading to job losses and reduced local spending—totaling $1.2 billion in economic damage over the past decade.
  • Racial Wealth Disparities Worsen: With an average Black household net worth of just $5,180 compared to $194,043 for white households, predatory lending exacerbates financial instability and economic exclusion.

Read the full report here.

January 30, 2025 / Criminal Justice, Economics, Equity

GBPI found disparities across race and income on the ability to pay fines and fees from traffic ticketsImage

Excessive reliance on fines and fees by local governments creates lasting barriers to economic security, particularly for Black Georgians and low-income individuals. The resulting debt can limit access to stable work, housing, and economic opportunities while increasing entanglement with the criminal legal system.

A survey conducted by the University of Georgia’s SPIA Survey Research Center on September 11, 2024, for the Georgia Budget & Policy Institute (GBPI), collected data to better understand the impact of everyday dynamics and historical discrimination on Black communities, which have led to overpolicing and the erosion of their income and wealth.

Statewide trends:

  • Nearly 15% of all Georgians have been unable to afford a traffic ticket at some point in their lives, with the rate rising to over 20% for Black Georgians and those earning $15,000–$49,000 per year.
  • Black Georgians are more than twice as likely as white Georgians to be placed on a payment plan for a traffic ticket they couldn’t pay on time.
  • Georgians of color are more likely to go into debt or face legal consequences, including criminal records, jail time, and misdemeanor probation, due to unpaid traffic tickets.

Read the full report here.

September 27, 2024 / Economics, Equity

Black-owned Businesses Improve Neighborhood Well-BeingImage

A recent Atlanta Wealth Building Initiative (AWBI) brief outlines how supporting Black-owned businesses can significantly improve neighborhood well-being.

Key takeaways:

  • Black-owned small businesses in Atlanta contribute significantly to neighborhood well-being, including a measurable increase in child well-being scores.

  • Black-owned businesses in Atlanta are disproportionately affected by rising commercial rents, making commercial affordability a significant barrier.

  • There are seven Black-owned small businesses for every 1,000 Black residents in Atlanta, but these businesses earn only $0.17 for every $1.00 earned by other small businesses.

  • The majority of Black-owned businesses in Atlanta have fewer than 20 employees and face challenges accessing capital due to systemic barriers.

  • Commercial rents in majority-Black neighborhoods have increased at a faster rate than in majority-white neighborhoods, contributing to the displacement of Black-owned businesses.

The brief advocates for policies that facilitate access to capital and resources for Black businesses, emphasizing that equitable support can lead to broader community improvements.

Read the full brief on AWBI’s website.

July 30, 2024 / Equity

Over the past 15 years, the Black-white gap in upward economic mobility shrank by 27%Image

In their new study (Chetty, Dobbie, Goldman, Porter, Yang), analyze changes in economic opportunity using new data on 57 million children born between 1978 and 1992 from anonymized Census and tax records. Although substantial racial gaps persist, we find rapid changes in the size of these gaps: over the past 15 years, the Black-white gap in upward economic mobility shrank by 27%. During the same period, class gaps expanded.

Some key insights:

  • The Black-white gap in upward mobility shrank significantly in the past 15 years.
  • In areas where Black children’s outcomes improved the most, white children also did relatively better.
  • Divergent trends in mobility by race and class were driven by changes in the communities in which children grew up, as measured by parental employment rates.
  • Social interactions are central to changing opportunity: children’s outcomes are shaped by parental employment rates of peers with whom they interact most.

Read the full report here.

June 26, 2024 / Equity, General

Less than 50% of prominent surveys collect any Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity dataImage

Last month, our partners from New Haven released their report “Invisible in Data, Excluded from Research,” showcasing the limited availability of disaggregated sexual orientation and gender identity data (SOGI).

Nationwide, the LGBTQ+ community is severely underrepresented in data and, therefore, missing from important conversations:

  • The American Community Survey just began collecting data on same-sex couples in 2019.
  • The Census does not ask questions about Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity.
  • Less than 50% of prominent public and private surveys collect any Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity data.
  • When data is collected, it is limited and fails to capture entire swaths of the LGBTQ community. Often, non-binary, trans, and two-spirit are left out as options altogether.

The lack of data collected about LGBTQ+ people and issues materially impacts policy decisions and the (re)distribution of resources.

This is particularly relevant considering the hostile environment in which we currently live, where a record-breaking 600 anti-trans bills were introduced across 49 states in 2023 alone.

Read the full report here.

May 20, 2024 / Equity

Despite Atlanta’s diversity, there’s still a clear divide in access to opportunity between communitiesImage

The Annie E. Casey Foundation released the latest Changing the Odds report, showcasing the progress the city of Atlanta has made but also the disproportionate challenges Black Atlantans face in their neighborhoods, schools and access to economic opportunity, impeding their ability to thrive in a rapidly growing city.

Some findings:

  • Although increasingly diverse, metro Atlanta shows a clear divide in access to opportunity between wealthier, majority-white communities and lower-income communities where the majority of residents are black.
  • While the employment rate for all Atlantans has increased, the unemployment rate for Black residents is three times higher than that of white residents.
  • Citywide alliances helped improve children’s learning and well-being, allowing Atlanta providers to retain and slightly expand childcare capacity between 2019 and 2022.

Explore Atlanta’s data landscape and find recommendations to address racial disparities and support thriving communities by reading the full report here.

March 27, 2024 / Equity, Workforce

Is Metro Atlanta bridging the gender pay gap?Image

This month, the Research and Analytics Division of the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) published an analysis of the gender pay gap in Metro Atlanta using 1-year estimates from the American Community Survey, which the Census Bureau has produced for 2005 to 2022.

Here are some of the findings:

  1. Women in metro Atlanta earn about 82 cents on the dollar compared with their male counterparts.
  2. Metro Atlanta has the 7th largest gender pay gap among the twenty largest metros in the United States.
  3. The gender gap has reduced by three cents from 21.2 cents in 2005 to 18 cents in 2022. Thus, while the gap has narrowed slightly over the last decade and a half, it remains quite wide.
  4. Disparities are lowest among protective service occupations (where women earn 93.3 cents on the dollar) and highest among health practitioners (where women earn only 65.6 cents on the dollar)—the wage gap is nearly 28 cents higher in those health occupations.

Read the full analysis in the 33°n blog post here.

March 22, 2024 / Equity, Workforce

Black women are crowded out of higher paying rolesImage

A new report by the Urban Institute explores how Black women are represented in vulnerable work. This includes work with less pay, benefits, and hours and alternative work arrangements like independent contracting, contract work, temp agency work, and on-call/day work.

Some key findings are: 

  • Black women are crowded out of higher-paying roles in comparison to white men, white women, and Black men.
  • Black women are underrepresented in occupations with higher rates of employer-sponsored health insurance as compared with white men but overrepresented in occupations with higher retirement coverage rates in comparison with white women.
  • Black women are also crowded into occupations that have fewer hours compared with Black men and white men.
  • When the share of temp agency workers in occupations—an arrangement with the lowest benefit rates and pay—increases, the representation of Black women increases, compared to white men.

This report is part of Urban’s Financial Well-Being Data Hub, which seeks to inform solutions to advance equity and improve households’ financial security.

Read the full report here.

December 15, 2023 / Basic Needs, Early Childhood, Education, Equity

There are 79 neighborhoods throughout Greater Atlanta with low and declining child well-beingImage

A few months ago, United Way of Greater Atlanta published the 2023 update of their Child Well-being Index. This data serves as a diagnostic tool to tell where each neighborhood is progressing toward saying that “all the children are well” and to guide how United Way directs its resources to most effectively improve child well-being and transform lives for the better.

Here are some key insights from this year’s update:

  • There are 79 neighborhoods throughout Greater Atlanta with low and declining child well-being.
  • Nearly 500,000 of Greater Atlanta’s 1.2 million children and youth live in high-need areas.
  • Data also shows that low child well-being scores disproportionately impact BIPOC populations.
  • Nearly 14,000 youth are not connected to school or work.
  • The overall regional score remained stable compared to 2018 – largely due to public and private funding and resources to offset damage from the pandemic. However, it is important to mention that since the data for the 2023 index scores was collected, these programs have largely ended.

Read the full report here.

November 28, 2023 / Commuting, Equity

Propel ATL’s ’38 Reasons Why’ report on 2022 pedestrian deaths within the city limitsImage

The new report, “38 Reasons Why,” published by Propel ATL, analyzes the 38 pedestrian deaths reported within city limits in 2022, the last year for which complete data is available.

Key takeaways:

  • The 38 pedestrian deaths in 2022 represent an increase of 23% over 2021 and 52% over 2020.
  • Over two-thirds of pedestrian fatalities occurred in majority-Black neighborhoods (25 out of 38 fatalities).
  • 63% of pedestrian fatalities occurred on roadways that didn’t have sidewalks, and 38% of bicycle and pedestrian crashes occurred on state routes that tend to lack sidewalks and bike lanes.
  • 29% of bicycle and pedestrian crashes were hit-and-runs.

“These trends highlight a glaring disparity in Atlanta’s pedestrian safety: People walking in Black neighborhoods or in low-income communities are more likely to lose their lives to traffic violence. These same neighborhoods also tend to have fewer roadway features like sidewalks, crosswalks, and bike lanes that keep people safe when traveling outside of cars”, the report says.

See the full Story Map here.

September 24, 2023 / Basic Needs, Economics, Equity, Inflation

U.S. Poverty Increased as pandemic-era programs endedImage

You may have noticed a drastic decrease in child poverty over the last couple of years. Now, you’ll see a dramatic increase as pandemic-era social safety net programs ended.

Based on the latest report on U.S. poverty by the census, the supplemental child poverty rate more than doubled, from 5.2 percent in 2021 to 12.4 percent in 2022.

The U.S. Census Bureau measures poverty in two ways every year. The first, called the official poverty measure, is based on cash resources. The second measure, the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), includes both cash and noncash benefits and subtracts necessary expenses (such as taxes and medical expenses).

The report explains, “Social Security continued to be the most important antipoverty program in 2022, moving 28.9 million people out of SPM poverty. Meanwhile, refundable tax credits moved 6.4 million people out of SPM poverty, down from 9.6 million people in 2021”.

Charts are from The New York Times.

June 26, 2023 / Equity

Some 17% of adult Americans younger than 30 identify as lesbian, gay or bisexualImage

As the United States LGBTQ+ Pride month comes to an end, the Pew Research Center shared five key findings about LGBTQ+ Americans from some of their recent surveys tracking LGBTQ+ topics such as gender identity, attitudes toward same-sex marriage, and experiences of LGBTQ+ Americans:

  1. Some 7% of Americans are lesbian, gay or bisexual.
  2. More Americans identify as bisexual than as gay or lesbian.
  3. Bisexual adults are far less likely than gay or lesbian adults to be “out” to the important people in their life.
  4. Some 1.6% of U.S. adults are transgender or nonbinary – that is, their gender differs from the sex they were assigned at birth.
  5. While a relatively small share of U.S. adults are transgender or nonbinary, many Americans say they know someone who is.