Growth in Residential Segregation by Income, 1970-2009

Posted by on November 27, 2011

Growth in Residential Segregation by Income, 1970-2009

Over the past four decades, the percentage of families living in middle-income neighborhoods has declined significantly, a new report from Stanford University finds.

Based on U.S. census data from 117 metropolitan areas, the report found that the share of American families living in either the poorest or most affluent neighborhoods more than doubled over the last forty years, from 15 percent in 1970 to 33 percent in 2007, while the share of families in middle-income neighborhoods fell from 65 percent to 44 percent. According to the New York Times, the shift represents more than just a growing income gap, as the study also found strong evidence of “residential sorting by income,” with the wealthy increasingly moving to exurban communities and gentrifying urban neighborhoods that are unaffordable for lower-income families. Indeed, while only 15 percent of families lived in either a poor or affluent neighborhood in 1970, that number had more than doubled, to 31 percent, by 2007.

http://www.s4.brown.edu/us2010/Data/Report/report111111.pdf