Racial Differences In Neighborhood Essay

Racial Differences in Neighborhood Quality Over the Life Course: The Contributions of Residential Mobility, Migration, and In Situ Change”

Introduction
The growing interests in life course theories have drawn attention to how lives are linked over time and space. Life course approach to neighborhood attainment highlights the interrelated and dynamic processes that individuals obtain their locations as they age. Studies suggest that people experience age-graded neighborhood change (Rand and Hirschl 2001; cite a couple of other studies). The life-cycle hypothesis points out that young adults tend to live in poorer and more disadvantaged neighborhoods given their limited socioeconomic resources. Over time, however, as they move into mid- and
Although it is well recognized that neighborhood sorting processes are key to understanding racial spatial inequalities (cf. Sampson and Sharkey 2010), the relative contribution of these sorting processes to the racial differences in neighborhood environment is unknown. In this article, we differentiate changes in neighborhood economic conditions and racial composition engendered by residential mobility between different types of neighborhoods from in situ changes. This procedure sheds light on several explanations of the racial differences in the neighborhood attainment over the life
Discriminatory practices by dominant group can reduce the ability of minorities to move out of racially segregated neighborhoods with low neighborhood quality. Consequently, blacks are more likely than whites to be “stuck” in poor and segregated neighborhoods (Sharkey 2012b). In addition, whites’ strong preference to avoid living near blacks (Farley et al. 1994) leads to white mobility out of black and racially-mixed areas into predominantly white neighborhoods (Crowder 2000; Krysan 2002; Quillian 2002; Wilson and Taub