The American poor spread to suburbia, but we’re not ready

NextAmericanCity
Yonah Freemark // February 25, 2010

Let’s face it: American public policy has yet to respond to or even grasp the profound change in settlement patterns that has been gradually making its mark on the nation’s landscape over the past few decades.

Cities from Detroit to Des Moines have been pushing the gentrification of their downtowns, with generally positive results, and the results are well documented.

But more consequential to a far larger group is the mass out-migration of impoverished people from center cities into the suburbs, often in the same metropolitan areas. According to a recent Brookings Institute Study, the process is accelerating. Between 2000 and 2008, the percent of poor people living in the suburbs increased by 25%, compared to by 5.6% in central cities and 15.4% for the nation as a whole. More of the poor now live in the suburbs than in central cities: 12.5 million versus 11 million.

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