The 5,000 financial institutions that originated a home loan in the U.S. are obliged by law to collect information about race. This policy is designed to help flag potential discrimination against borrowers, and has generated reams of data used by researchers, academics and the lenders themselves to halt it.
The significance of the data, which is collected pursuant to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, is further reflected in the fact it has, in the past year alone, been cited by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Federal Financial Institutions Examinations Council, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, among others.
