Changing the Odds for Vulnerable Children by OECD

Author:OECD
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: socialissues
Publisher: OECD Publishing
Published: 2019-11-19T00:00:00+00:00

Neighbourhoods

Neighbourhoods affect the social, cultural, and demographic conditions that contribute to child well-being. A growing body of research argues that neighbourhoods have a causal effect on child and later adult outcomes, distinct from family factors (Chetty and Hendren, 2018[97]; Deutscher, 2018[98]). Neighbourhoods vary in the opportunities available for children to do well; some have supportive mechanisms in place that enhance child development, while others have too many stressors and not enough protective factors. Neighbourhoods increase the difficulties experienced by families through concentrated poverty11, social isolation (particularly from mainstream institutions), and joblessness (Wilson, 2013[99]).

Several non-experimental studies have linked poor child and adolescent outcomes to the neighbourhood level. These include externalised behavioural problems and lower cognitive abilities (Donnelly et al., 2017[100]); anti-social behaviours (Odgers et al., 2012[101]); risky sexual behaviours (Leventhal, Dupéré and Brooks-Gunn, 2009[102]); higher incarceration and teenage births rates (Chetty et al., 2018[103]); and lower adult earnings, college enrolment and marriage rates (Chetty and Hendren, 2018[97]). Moreover, growing up in a toxic environment (i.e. neighbourhoods with concentrations of violence, incarcerations and lead exposure) independently predicted poorer adult outcomes for low-income children, after accounting for demographic factors.12 However, the associated neighbourhood effects are different by race and gender: lower social mobility among white children; adult incarceration and lower income rank relative to parents’ earnings among black boys; and teenage births among black girls (Manduca and Sampson, 2019[104]).

In OECD countries, there is evidence that income inequality has taken on clear spatial dimensions. In urban areas, affluent and low-income households often live in clearly separate neighbourhoods. Neighbourhoods in European cities are, on average, less spatially segregated by income than those in North America. Nonetheless, patterns in spatial segregation differ across countries. In Denmark and the Netherlands, on average lower income households experience the highest levels of segregation, whereas in Canada, France and the United States the most affluent households concentrate in specific areas of cities (OECD, 2016[105]).

Research on neighbourhood effects within OECD countries has been mainly based on the United States and to a lesser extent Australia, Denmark and Germany. Evidence of neighbourhood effects are strongest in the United States and Australia and weaker in Denmark and Germany. In the United States, the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) experiment randomly assigned housing vouchers to low-income families; some on the condition of families moving to lower-poverty neighbourhood. Over the long run, MTO has shown that the integration low-income families into mixed-income neighbourhoods can help reduce persistent poverty and increase inter-generational mobility. Moving to a low-poverty neighbourhood during childhood (below the age of 13) had a positive effect on inter-generational mobility, but gains fell with age underlining that the longer exposure to a better environment the more improved adult outcomes are. The disruption of moving neighbourhood after age 13 may even have a negative effect on adult outcomes (Chetty et al., 2016[106]). In Australia, the opposite effect was shown on moves undertaken during adolescences; one year in a better environment is more valuable in adolescence than in early childhood because of the long-lasting peer effects and the probability as a young worker of entering the local labour market (Deutscher, 2018[98]).

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