Reducing Poverty and Economic Disress after ARRA: Potential Roles for Place-Conscious Strategies

In what follows, we lay out the case for new, place-conscious strategies. We begin by reviewing the well-documented case that place does indeed matter—that where you grow up affects where you wind up. We then consider neighborhood revitalization approaches, pointing out both the potential and the limits of such programs. We turn to mobility approaches, reviewing the evidence on how life chances are altered by relocation to opportunity-rich neighborhoods. We then consider the regional equity perspective, a view that tries to place the fortunes of low-income residents and places in the context of the metropolitan region, and ask what differences this might make for policy. Building on experience and evidence from these three policy strands, we recommend principles for the federal government’s place-conscious policies going forward and suggest some specific applications for these principles. Finally, because policy is shaped as much by politics as by research and analysis, we close by considering the coalitions necessary to bring about a new place-conscious approach.

Manuel Pastor and Margery Austin Turner

Urban Institute

April 14, 2010

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