Quote:
Originally Posted by grizy
I'm talking about post CRA era.
Blacks are much less geographically mobile (even less than poor non-white Hispanics) than pretty much everyone else, even first gen immigrants.
This is a small, but measurable, contributor to why blacks are more entrenched in poverty than pretty much every other group (non-white Hispanics included).
I think you're sort of ignoring that there are huge costs and risks involved in uprooting from one locale to another that are exacerbated for poor people. A college educated person will have contacts in many cities, the ability to receive job offers before moving, and usually some level of monetary cushion/family support/job alternatives to fall back on if things don't work out.
Some random midwestern waiter usually can't apply for similar jobs in nyc before arriving, is less likely to have contacts in the city, will probably even struggle to find a place to stay, and will face much greater competition in the job market. The risk of failure and the consequences of that failure are perilously high.
There are also more (anti?) pull factors keeping them in their current towns, with higher teen pregnancy rates probably the biggest.
Also, as a consequence of the higher barriers, immigrant populations tend to be smarter, more ambitious, and ultimately more successful than both the populations they are leaving and those they are arriving in, an effect that scales with distance traveled.