Migration Patterns and the Growth of High‐Poverty Neighborhoods, 1970‐1990 Author(s): Lincoln Quillian Source: American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 105, No. 1 (July 1999), pp. 1-37 Published by: The University of Chicago Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/210266 . Accessed: 02/04/2015 21:38 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The University of Chicago Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to American Journal of Sociology. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 128.95.71.159 on Thu, 2 Apr 2015 21:38:06 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Migration Patterns and the Growth of High- Poverty Neighborhoods, 1970±19901 Lincoln Quillian University of Wisconsin, Madison Using geocoded data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, this article examines why the number of high-poverty neighborhoods in American cities has increased since 1970. The main ®ndings are (1) the migration of the nonpoor away from moderately poor neighbor- hoods has been a key process in forming new high-poverty neighbor- hoods, although in the early 1980s increasing poverty rates were also important; and (2) African-Americans have moved into predomi- nately white neighborhoods at a pace suf®cient to increase their numbers there, but neighborhoods with increasing black popula- tions tend to lose white population rapidly. Implications for theories of poor neighborhoods are discussed. William Wilson's book The Truly Disadvantaged (1987) ®rst pointed out that, starting in the 1970s, areas of concentrated urban poverty increas- ingly took on a different character than they had earlier in the century. Like the ethnic ghettos that have long interested urban sociologists, dwell- ers in modern poor urban neighborhoods are almost all members of minor- ity races or ethnicities. Unlike older ethnic ghettos, however, Wilson ar- gues that the minority-populated urban neighborhoods of the 1970s and 1 An earlier version of this article was presented at the meetings of the American Sociological Association in New York City, August 1996. I have bene®ted from helpful comments on earlier versions from Christopher Winship and audiences at University of Wisconsin, Madison; Yale University; University of California, Los Angeles; Uni- versity of Chicago; University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Pennsylvania State University; University of Washington; Stanford University; and Tufts University. This article was written when I was supported by a dissertation grant from the Spen- cer foundation. Some of the data used in this analysis are derived from sensitive data ®les of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, obtained under special contractual ar- rangements designed to protect the anonymity of respondents. These data are not available from the author. Persons interested in obtaining PSID sensitive data ®les should contact Frank P. Stafford, PSID, Box 1248, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106-1248. E-mail: [email protected]. Direct correspondence to Lincoln Quillian, Department of Sociology, University of Wisconsin, 8128 Social Sciences Building, 1180 Observa- tory Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706-1393. E-mail: [email protected] 1999 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved. 0002-9602/2000/10501-0001$02.50 AJS Volume 105 Number 1 (July 1999): 1±37 1 This content downloaded from 128.95.71.159 on Thu, 2 Apr 2015 21:38:06 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions American Journal of Sociology 1980s contained an especially high concentration of poor families. He hy- pothesizes that one cause of this trend is that middle-class blacks in the 1970s and 1980s increasingly relocated to predominately white suburbs, leaving behind neighborhoods composed largely of poor or near-poor fam- ilies. Wilson's work leads empirical researchers to examine data to con®rm or deny these suspicions. Investigations by Jargowsky (1994, 1997) have con®rmed some of Wilson's hypotheses, ®nding that the proportion of the urban population living in census tracts in which at least 40% of the population is poor increased from 3% of the urban population in 1970 to 4.5% in 1990 (Jargowsky 1997, p. 38). Tests of Wilson's hypotheses about why this has occurred have been contradictory, and there remains a con- siderable debate about why poor urban neighborhoods have expanded so sharply. An increase in the number of extremely poor neighborhoods can be thought of as resulting from a combination of two proximate causes: change in the number of poor persons and change in the tendency for persons of like poverty status to live close to each other. I decompose ¯ows of persons among neighborhood and poverty status categories over time to examine how each of these proximate causes has in¯uenced the number of high-poverty neighborhoods. This procedure sheds light on several ex- planations of the increase in neighborhood poverty. Along the way, I consider evidence relevant to debates about the role of racial segregation in explaining concentrated urban poverty. I argue that studies of the role of racial segregation in forming high-poverty neigh- borhoods have not always clearly separated evidence about change over time from evidence about cross-sectional variation and have not fully con- sidered the dynamics of neighborhood change. Research has found that racial segregation in American cities remains very high, even for high- income black families (Denton and Massey 1988; Massey and Denton 1993). This has been interpreted as inconsistent with Wilson's claims that middle-class blacks are migrating into white neighborhoods. A central ®nding of this article is that, when considered as part of a dynamic metro- politan setting, these apparently contradictory ®ndings can be reconciled. Middle-class blacks have been moving into white neighborhoods at rates high enough to increase their numbers there, but declining white popula- tions in neighborhoods with substantial black populations have prevented a large increase in the share of blacks in white nonpoor neighborhoods. PAST THEORY AND RESEARCH Three explanations predominate in the literature on the causes of high- poverty neighborhoods. These are that high-poverty neighborhoods result 2 This content downloaded from 128.95.71.159 on Thu, 2 Apr 2015 21:38:06 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Migration Patterns from black middle-class ¯ight from mixed-income neighborhoods, that high-poverty neighborhoods are the result of racial segregation, and that high-poverty neighborhoods are the result of the poor job prospects of inner-city workers (Massey, Gross, and Shibuya 1994). After de®ning a high-poverty neighborhood, I review each of these explanations with re- gard to what it can tell us about why the number of poor neighborhoods has increased over time. Then I turn to my own data analysis of patterns of migration to provide clues about these three theories. Most prior research has de®ned high-poverty neighborhoods by a ®xed cutoff based on the percentage of persons living in families with income below the federal poverty line, usually 30% or 40% (Wilson 1987; Jargow- sky and Bane 1991). De®ning poor neighborhoods based on a ®xed cutoff point makes theoretical sense if there are thresholds in neighborhood pov- erty rates beyond which neighborhoods become substantially less livable. Jargowsky and Bane (1991) toured a number of cities, comparing block census maps showing poverty percentages to their impressions based on visual appearances. Areas with more than 40% poverty rates contained more dilapidated housing stock and seemed signi®cantly more distressed than neighborhoods with poverty rates of 20%±40%, which had a more working-class character.2 Following their work, I consider an extremely poor neighborhood to be a census tract in which more than 40% of persons are in families with incomes below the of®cial poverty line.3 Black Middle-Class Flight In The Truly Disadvantaged, Wilson (1987) argues that one of the key forces that led to the increase in the number of extremely poor neighbor- hoods was the movement of middle-class residents, especially middle-class African-American residents, from mixed-income neighborhoods to subur- ban, white neighborhoods. With the departure of middle-class blacks from inner-city, mixed-income neighborhoods, the population left behind was 2 Areas that were more than 40% poor also corresponded well to areas local census of®cials considered ªghettos.º This standard has also been adopted by the U.S. Census Bureau, which refers to areas where more than 40% of the population is poor as ªextreme poverty areasº (U.S. Bureau of the Census 1995). 3 Census tracts are small population units of 2,500±8,000 residents (average about 4,000) that are designed to be homogeneous with respect to population characteristics, economic status, and living conditions. They are drawn in such a way as to correspond roughly to what is normally thought of as a small neighborhood by people familiar with the local geography. For a discussion of how census tract boundaries are drawn and the advantages and disadvantages of considering census tracts as neighborhoods, see White (1987, pp. 18±20, 286±300). 3 This content downloaded from 128.95.71.159 on Thu, 2 Apr 2015 21:38:06 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions American Journal of Sociology ªa much higher concentration of the most disadvantaged segments of the black urban populationº (1987, p.