Why Your Neighborhood Can Determine Whether Your Child Thrives as an Adult

Matthew Brown, "Why Your Neighborhood can Determine Whether Your Child Thrives as an Adult," Deseret News, May 1, 2019, Online.

     Libraries, community centers, parks, houses of worship and other neighborhood gathering places can unlock opportunities for children to achieve the American Dream. That's what experts told a joint congressional committee Tuesday in Washington, asserting that rebuilding declining communities to foster social connections is key to closing the widening gap of economic inequality in America today. [1]
...
     Dr. Patrick Sharkey, a sociology professor at New York University, said government policies offering incentives to reversing a 50-year trend of families, businesses and social institutions fleeing economically hard-hit communities could address the disparities that Hendren's research revealed.
     "The most effective way to build stronger communities is to invest in core public institutions like schools and libraries, and public amenities like parks and playgrounds, that bring people together in shared spaces," he said.

COMMENT

      In his testimony, Dr. Sharkey cites a poll from the American Enterprise Institute that identifies schools and libraries as the top to elements that make communities successful. [2]   He goes on to say that there are three ways to build successful neighborhoods, 1) scale back policies that create geographic inequality 2) help families move to better neighborhoods and 3) community investment.  

     It's hard to say where the cause and effect lies. Future success  seems to depend largely on how much help kids get from their parents. And of course, rich people generally live in nicer neighborhoods. However, the U.S. Census Bureau says that children who grow up just a few miles apart in families with comparable incomes can have very different life outcomes. [3]  In fact, I do earn far less than my parents and I do live in a neighborhood with less social capital. It's not my preference. I would have loved to buy a house in the neighborhood where I grew up, but it's out of my price range.  I suppose my kids are doomed. At least we have a nice public library, although the neighborhood branch is currently closed for repairs due to flooding that was probably a result of climate change.
  


[1] U.S. Congress, Joint Economic Committee, Expanding Opportunity by Strengthening Families, Communities, and Civil Society [hearing] (April 29, 2019). 

[2] AEI Survey on Community and Society (February 2019).  

[3] The Opportunity Atlas: Mapping the Social Roots of Social Mobility (U.S. Census Bureau, October 2018).