Socio-Economic Segregation in Large Cities in France and the United States

This working paper calculates measures of the level of socioeconomic segregation in large metropolitan areas (cities and their surrounding suburbs) in the United States and France. The authors define “large” metropolitan areas as city-suburb combinations with a population of greater than one million. They use tract data from the American Community Survey (2006-2010) and data from the French Census of 2008 and the French Ministry of Finance. The results reveal a significantly higher level of socioeconomic segregation in large American than in French cities. American cities are more segregated than French cities on all three measures considered here: income, employment, and education. This finding holds with measures that account for different distributions of income, unemployment, and education across the two countries. The researchers also find (1) a strong pattern of low-income neighborhoods in central cities, and high-income neighborhoods in suburbs in the United States, but not in France; (2) that high-income persons are the most segregated group in both countries; (3) that the shares of neighborhood income differences that can be explained by neighborhood race-ethnic composition are similar in France and the United States, suggesting that racial segregation cannot account for much of the higher level of U.S. socioeconomic segregation

Ethnic Fragmentation and Police Spending: Social Identity and a Public Good

We present evidence that more ethnically fragmented communities spend, all else equal, more on police services than less fragmented communities. We introduce a model of spending on police services which we use to interpret the data. In this model, we assume that the decision to commit a crime is a rational consideration of the costs and benefits and that spending on police services reduces the attractiveness of committing a crime. We also assume that being a victim of crime affects a loss in utility. However this victimization cost, if victim and perpetrator are a different ethnicity, is greater than or equal to that if the perpetrator is the same ethnicity. A consequence of the model is that a higher level of spending on police services is associated with more ethnically fragmented communities only when agents suffer this differential cost of victimization. These results contribute to our understanding of the stylized fact that spending on police services is increasing at a time in which crime rates are falling. Further, our results provide empirical support for the contention that people have a larger cost of victimization when the perpetrator is a different ethnicity

Ethnic Concentration and Extreme Right-Wing Voting Behavior in West Germany

Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) and administrative data from 1996 to 2009, I investigate the question whether or not right-wing extremism of German residents is affected by the ethnic concentration of foreigners living in the same residential area. My results show a positive but insignificant relationship between ethnic concentration at county level and the probability of extreme right-wing voting behavior for West Germany. However, due to potential endogeneity issues, I additionally instrument the share of foreigners in a county with the share of foreigners in each federal state (following an approach of Dustmann/Preston 2001). I find evidence for the interethnic contact theory, predicting a negative relationship between foreigners' share and right-wing voting. Moreover, I analyze the moderating role of education and the influence of cultural traits on this relationship

Relationships Between Religion and Intolerance Towards Muslims and Immigrants in Europe:A Multilevel Analysis

This paper examines relationships between religiosity and intolerance towards Muslims and immigrants among Europeans living in non-Muslim majority countries by applying multilevel modeling to European Values Study data (wave four, 2010). Thus relationships across 44 national contexts are analyzed. The analysis found large between-country differences in the overall levels of intolerance towards immigrants and Muslims. Eastern Europeans tend to be more intolerant than Western Europeans. In most countries Muslims are less accepted than immigrants,—a finding which reflects that in post-9/11 Europe Islamophobia is prevalent and many still see Muslims with suspicion. A key result is that believing matters for the citizen’s attitudes towards Muslims and immigrants. Across Europe, traditional and modern fuzzy beliefs in a Higher Being are strongly negatively related to intolerance towards immigrants and Muslims, while fundamentalism is positively related to both targets of intolerance. Religious practice and denominational belonging on the other hand matter far less for the citizen’s propensity to dislike the two out-groups. With the only exception of non-devout Protestants who do not practice their religion, members of religious denominations are not more intolerant than non-members. The findings are valid for the vast majority of countries although countries differ in the magnitude of the effects

Six-Country Discrimination in Hiring Meta-Analysis Data

"RDS" (R format) file containing replication data for Quillian and Lee, "Trends in Racial and Ethnic Discrimination in Hiring in Six Western Countries", PNAS 2023. "Code" subdirectory includes code, output, and a pdf file describing code and output. Link to article: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.221287512

Segregation as a Source of Contextual Advantage: A Formal Theory with Application to American Cities

A frequently cited model of why segregation contributes to inequality is that segregation increases the level of contextual advantage of advantaged segregated groups and the level of contextual disadvantage of disadvantaged segregated groups. This paper provides a formal demographic model of this process. The model begins with two groups that differ along a dimension of average advantage and disadvantage, for instance, two racial groups that differ in their poverty rates. The model illustrates how the contextual advantages and disadvantages from segregation are affected by a series of demographic conditions: group relative size, group advantage-disadvantage rates, group effects on advantage-disadvantage rates of nongroup neighbors, and advantage-disadvantage effects on group contact. The paper outlines a series of eleven conclusions from the theoretical model and applies the theoretical model to understanding racial segregation effects on racial group neighborhood poverty contact in American cities