Nov. 11: “The Cumulative Impact of Federal Place-Based Policies on Neighborhood Inequality, 1990-2019”

Abstract: “Concentrated neighborhood disadvantage remains a defining feature of the U.S. landscape, sustained by legacies of racial exclusion and public disinvestment. In recent decades, the federal government has increasingly invested in high-poverty neighborhoods via place-based policies—spatially targeted interventions designed to improve economic opportunity, housing, and local infrastructure. Although prior research has examined the effects of specific place-based programs, we know less about the collective and cumulative impact of the place-based policy field as a whole. This study develops a novel framework for assessing policy impact at the field level to evaluate how an array of federal place-based housing and economic development initiatives have jointly reshaped disadvantaged neighborhoods. Using longitudinal data that link federal funding streams to specific neighborhoods from 1990 to 2019, we find that federal economic development programs significantly improved local economic and housing indicators but also induced racialized patterns of residential displacement. By contrast, place-based federal housing programs increased property values while preserving rental affordability and demographic stability. We assess the ecological significance of these changes and find that they were substantial enough to alter durable patterns of neighborhood stratification within metropolitan areas. This analysis highlights how examining the collective and cumulative influence of policy fields—rather than discrete interventions—illuminates the state’s evolving role in producing and potentially transforming urban inequality.”