Restaurant owners of color struggle to stay afloat during the pandemic

UCLA CNK was recently featured in a news article covering how the COVID-19 pandemic has hit small businesses hard, especially those owned by people of color.

By April, for instance, 41 percent of Black-owned and 32 percent of Latinx-owned businesses nationwide had folded, according to a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper published in June. Just under 20 percent of white-owned businesses had shuttered within that period.

In neighborhoods undergoing so-called revitalization—where many minority-owned businesses already teeter in precarious positions—these closures impact not only the individual businesses, but ultimately the fabric of their communities. Paul Ong, director of the Center for Neighborhood Knowledge at UCLA, sees the possibility that the pandemic may hasten neighborhood change.

“If these areas remain attractive places for outside investments, then the vacancies and opportunities created by minority business closures will speed up the transformation, and can lead to additional waves of business and residential displacement,” Ong said. “In other words, gentrification.”

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