A dominant pattern in both the US and Latin America has been the resistance of the dominant white communities to sharing in the financing of public investments in the “human capital” (health and education) of the black and indigenous communities. While European societies have developed social welfare states with universal access to public health and education services, elites throughout the Americas have tended to favor private-sector provision of health and education, in part reflecting white populations’ unwillingness to pay for social services for other ethnic and racial groups.