Harvard Releases Report on American Indian Socio-Economic Change From 1990-2000

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.
Identified for decades as the poorest group in the United States, American Indians living on reservations made substantial gains, both economically and socially, during the final decade of the 20th century. A new report released by The Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development at the Kennedy School of Government compiles the data from the 1990 and 2000 U.S. Censuses for 15 key socio-economic indicators. The data on measures ranging from income and poverty to unemployment, education and housing conditions indicate that although substantial gaps remain between America's Native population and the rest of U.S. society, rapid economic and social development is taking place among gaming and non-gaming tribes alike.

"American Indians on Reservations: A Databook of Socioeconomic Change Between the 1990 and 2000 Censuses" assembles the publicly available U.S. Census data for 1990 and 2000 on the socio-economic status of single-race American Indian individuals living in Indian land areas that did and did not have gaming operations before Jan. 1, 2000. Gaming and non-gaming reservations are compared to each other and to the United States as a whole. Also released in conjunction with the report is an annotated bibliography of existing research into the economic and social consequences of Indian and other gaming. The bibliography provides a guide to more than 130 studies, giving researchers brief synopses of research methods, topic coverage, data sources and reported findings.

The Census report reflects a mosaic of the tremendous changes experienced by individual Indians living on reservations during a time of increasing political self-determination by Indian tribes and the unprecedented expansion in gaming activities under the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988.