American Economic Review Vol. 114 No. 5 2024
Creating Moves to Opportunity: Experimental Evidence on Barriers to Neighborhood Choice
Abstract
Low-income families often live in low-upward-mobility neighborhoods. We study why by using a randomized trial with housing voucher recipients that provided information, financial support, and customized search assistance to move to high-opportunity neighborhoods. The treatment increased the fraction moving to high-upward-mobility areas from 15 to 53 percent. A second trial reveals this treatment effect is driven primarily by customized search assistance. Qualitative interviews show that the intervention relaxed bandwidth constraints and addressed family-specific needs. Our findings imply many low-income families do not have strong preferences to stay in low-opportunity areas and that barriers in housing search significantly increase residential segregation by income.
- DOI
- 10.1257/aer.20200407
- Volume
- 114
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 1281-1337
- Language
- en
- Sources
- openalex bibtex:phds-export.bib crossref