The role of zoning in urban segregation and inequities

Jonathan Rothwell of the Brookings Institute wonders why cities such as San Jose are so fragmented into separate racial and ethnic groups (see Census map illustration). He examines, in Reason magazine, how zoning laws, essentially unheard of in the United States until the early 20th Century, have disadvantaged minorities and caused vast social inequities.  

"A century of zoning has also fostered segregation by race and class. Native-born people of African descent are roughly three times more segregated (according to a measure called the entropy index) in the United States than in England. Immigrants and low-income households are also far more segregated in the United States than in many parts of Europe.

"The United States stands out as having the largest gap between rich and poor in neighborhood quality among rich democracies. Using Gallup World Poll data from 2009-17, I was able to calculate the percentage of people in each country who rate their neighborhood favorably in terms of overall satisfaction, safety, affordability, and similar measures. I found that people in the bottom income quintile in the U.S. were roughly 15 percentage points less likely to give favorable answers than people in the top income quintile. That compresses to a gap of only two percentage points in Sweden."

Read the whole thing at Reason magazine.

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