Doctoral Disseration: Who Gets Credit? The Economic Value of Social Status in Money Lending

Rutgers University New Brunswick, New Brunswick NJ

Investigators

Abstract

SES 0082434 PI: Lee Clarke, Lynne Moulton This project examines ways lenders make decisions about borrowers, focusing on "non-economic" factors such as a borrower's social status. It includes both profit-making and non-profit lending organizations. Many investigators have noted that various types of "discrimination" probably figure into lending decisions, and this study attempts to specify the processes involved by examining the application and decision processes directly. Some of the factors to be measured are how characteristics of borrowers signal loan officers of their reliability, and how those factors are used differently by loan officers in traditional and marginal loan markets. The study emphasizes decision processes in the loan applications rather than outcomes.