August 2019

For many families, the way out of poverty is to move to a better neighborhood A new study shows modest investments in information combined with supportive services can help them make that move. We need to rethink attachment to neighborhood, and see moving as one way out of poverty for many low income households The […]

What City Observatory did this week 1. CityLab: Everything you think you know about gentrification is wrong. We take a look at a recent CityLab article reporting (faithfully) the findings of some recent research on gentrification in New York City. The study, which looked at households with kids in the Medicaid program, found that low

Facts are stubborn things: And they don’t support the folk wisdom equating gentrification with displacement. There’s a palpable and growing amount of cognitive dissonance between the accepted conventional wisdom about the intrinsically evil nature of gentrification, and a body of careful detailed research that shows that its either not bad, or actually produces measurable benefits.