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New evidence suggests that reducing intergenerational poverty and generating positive taxpayer returns are possible through housing policy. Raj Chetty, Nathaniel Hendren, and Lawrence F. Katz evaluate the causal effects of improving neighborhood conditions for low-income families on their future economic outcomes.
In this study, “The Effects Of Exposure To Better Neighborhoods On Children: New Evidence From The Moving To Opportunity Experiment,” the authors find robust evidence that young children (ages four to 12) whose families move to lower-poverty neighborhoods are more likely to attend college, less likely to become single parents, and have substantially higher incomes.
These positive impacts are durable and persist through to the next generation. The grandchildren of families that moved are more likely to be raised in lower-poverty neighborhoods by two parents who are each more likely to have attended college and have a higher levels of household income. Moreover, the initial public investment is likely to yield net gains by significantly increasing the children’s future earnings, while reducing government expenditures.
The study examines data from an initiative called Moving to Opportunity (MTO). Previously, Chetty and Hendren had studied more than five million families that moved across communities and found that neighborhoods have causal exposure effects on children’s outcomes. Past studies had also consistently shown that MTO had no significant impact on earnings and employment of adults and older youth (ages 13 to 18). Yet the question remained, what about the young children? This question is now possible to answer because younger MTO children are finally old enough to enter the labor market.
Read more here. (Chicago Policy Review)
In this study, “The Effects Of Exposure To Better Neighborhoods On Children: New Evidence From The Moving To Opportunity Experiment,” the authors find robust evidence that young children (ages four to 12) whose families move to lower-poverty neighborhoods are more likely to attend college, less likely to become single parents, and have substantially higher incomes.
These positive impacts are durable and persist through to the next generation. The grandchildren of families that moved are more likely to be raised in lower-poverty neighborhoods by two parents who are each more likely to have attended college and have a higher levels of household income. Moreover, the initial public investment is likely to yield net gains by significantly increasing the children’s future earnings, while reducing government expenditures.
The study examines data from an initiative called Moving to Opportunity (MTO). Previously, Chetty and Hendren had studied more than five million families that moved across communities and found that neighborhoods have causal exposure effects on children’s outcomes. Past studies had also consistently shown that MTO had no significant impact on earnings and employment of adults and older youth (ages 13 to 18). Yet the question remained, what about the young children? This question is now possible to answer because younger MTO children are finally old enough to enter the labor market.
Read more here. (Chicago Policy Review)
