The Nature of Concentrated Urban Poverty in Canada and the United States

Zoltan L. Hajnal

Abstract

A detailed examination of concentrated urban poverty in Canada's cities in 1986 reveals that Canada has proportionally more people in concentrated urban poverty than the United States. Concentrated urban poverty in Canada means not only poverty, but also high levels of a host of social dislocations. In the second ha lf of this essay the causes of concentrated urban poverty are addressed. Using comparative data, I test the applicability of two theories which cite either racial segregation or a specific structural history as the root of concentrated urban poverty. My analysis indicates that race and ethnicity greatly influence one's chances of living in concentrated urban poverty. However, it is clear that for the majority of Canada's concentrated urban poor who are white, a historical pattern of rapid immigrat ion, manufacturing decline, and central city depopulation is at the heart of their impoverished status.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my three reviewers at the CJS for their extremely helpful comments and suggestions. Michael Dawson, Taeku Lee, Julie Alig, and William J. Wilson also offered valuable assistance and much needed encouragement. Addr ess correspondence to Zoltan Hajnal, Department of Political Science, Pick Hall, University of Chicago, 5828 S. University Ave., Chicago, IL 60637 (e-mail:zoli@cicero.spc.uchicago .edu)

Introduction

Since 1970, concentrated urban poverty has grown dramatically in the United States, to the point where well over two million poor people in America live in severely impoverished neighborhoods. In almost all cases this dramatic growth in the concentr ation of poverty has been accompanied by disturbingly high levels of welfare dependency, educational deficiencies, labor force non- participation, and other social dislocations. This essay is an attempt to illustrate the size and consequences of this p henomenon in Canada and to understand the structural causes of concentrated urban poverty in cities across Canada and the United States.

Over the last decade, the phenomenon of concentrated urban poverty has received tremendous attention from American researchers. This attention has unfortunately revealed an ominous social problem that is growing across American cities (Wilson, 1987 ; Coulton et al., 1990; Nelson, 1991). Research has shown that the number of poor people living in concentrated urban poverty in the United States grew by 29.5 percent between 1970 and 1980 (Jargowsky and Bane, 1991). In 1980 the US Census indicated th at there were over 1,800,000 poor persons living in concentrated urban poverty in America's 100 largest central cities.[1]The number of concentrated urban poor was expected to continue its escalation in the 1980s (Nelson, 1991).Research has also demonstrated that this concentrated urban poverty population is divided along specific racial and regional lines, with Blacks in the core of older, industrial centres of the Northeast and Midwest facing the worst cond itions (Jargowsky and Bane, 1991). This expansion of concentrated urban poverty is disturbing because it implies not only extreme levels of poverty, but also extreme levels of a variety of social disorders that may ultimately lead to social isolation and the perpetuation of poverty.[2]

In contrast to the intense American debate stands a Canadian poverty literature that is almost completely devoid of any mention of concentrated urban poverty. The magnitude of concentrated urban poverty in Canadian cities has not been explored and r emains virtually unknown.[3] Although there are important differences between the two countries, especially with regard to racial histories, there are also important similarities which suggest that Canadian cities should be suffering from the same extreme levels of concentrated poverty that exist in the US.

The first goal of this project is to provide a thorough examination of concentrated urban poverty in Canada's twenty-five consolidated metropolitan areas. In so doing, I want to bring attention to a previously ignored but obviously very serious soci al issue in Canada. Through my research I will show that concentrated urban poverty, which I define as any area where greater than forty percent of the residents have an income below the poverty line, exists in Canada. I will also show that it is exten sive, and that it is associated with a number of mutually damaging conditions, such as welfare dependency, educational deficiencies, and labor force non-participation. Finally, I will demonstrate that the over 600,000 people living in concentrated urb an poverty in Canada's Consolidated Metropolitan Areas (CMA) in 1986 were distributed along distinct spatial, racial, and ethnic lines, with older industrial cities like Montreal and ethnic groups such as Aboriginal groups and Blacks suffering disprop ortionately.

The second goal of the project is to use knowledge of Canadian concentrated urban poverty to help answer the question, "What causes concentrated urban poverty?" More specifically, through an examination of the histories of specific Canadian and A merican cities, I will assess the relative merits of two theories that explain the rise and growth of concentrated urban poverty in the United States. These theories stress the importance of either racial segregation (Massey, 1990) or specific structur al patterns (Wilson, 1987). In addition, this comparative analysis should provide a greater understanding of the role of various governmental structures and social policies in hindering or aiding the development of concentrated urban poverty.

While the empirical analyses and conclusions in this paper are tentative, my examination of the Canadian data does lead to several important findings. First, the role of race in the development of concentrated urban poverty is decidedly mixed. Race and ethnicity are important in that they greatly influence one's chances of living in concentrated urban poverty in Canada. However, it is clear that for the majority of Canada's concentrated urban poor who are white, race or ethnicity is not a factor . Second, the spatial distribution of concentrated urban poverty across Canadian cities suggests a close linkage to aggregate poverty rates. Finally, Canadian data do lend support to a more structuralist view of concentrated urban poverty. The distrib ution of concentrated urban poverty in Canada conforms, if imperfectly, to the structural framework developed by William Julius Wilson (1987).

The American Underclass[4]

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s poverty became more urban, more concentrated, and more deeply rooted in big cities, particularly in older industrial centers of the Northeast and Midwest (Wacquant and Wilson, 1989). These trends were especially acute for Blacks and Hispanics, which prompted researchers to posit the existence of a new underclass of poor and isolated urban minorities (Auletta, 1982). The transformation is most clearly illustrated in cities like New York and Chicago, where the number of people living in concentrated poverty roughly tripled between 1970 and 1980. Although national totals are not yet available for 1990, preliminary studies indicate that concentrated urban poverty continued to expand during the 1980s (Nelson, 1991). The racial bias of this phenomenon is also abundantly clear. The concentrated urban poor living in American metropolitan areas in 1980 were 67 percent Black, 20 percent Hispanic, and only 12 percent White.

Several authors have attempted to provide a theoretical outline of the social and economic processes that have caused the emergence and growth of concentrated urban poverty. The most commonly cited answer to the question, "What causes concentrated urban poverty?" has been advanced by William Julius Wilson in The Truly Disadvantaged. Wilson argues that the emergence and growth of the underclass stems from a complex web of structural and cultural developments. His theory has the following framework: (1) As minorities, primarily Blacks, migrated to cities in the Northe ast and Midwest, they faced ongoing discrimination which led to severe residential segregation. (2) Racial discrimination also confined urban minorities to certain sectors of the labor market, including the manufacturing industry.[5< /a>][](3) In the 1970s and 1980s there was a sharp decline in manufacturing employment in central cities of the Northeast and Midwest.[6] This decline disproportionately affected minorities as employment shifted either to other regions or to the suburbs where minorities were seldom located. The few service jobs that were created in central cities either could not sustain a family above poverty or required skills that most urban minorities did not possess. (4) Both the skills mismatch and the spatial mismatch that arose for inner city workers led directly to a rise in minority joblessness.[7] (5) Male joblessness contributed to falling marriage rates and expanding rates of lone family headship. (6) In turn, increased lone headship has meant an escalation in welfare dependency and other social dislocations, and ultimately an increase in the concentration of poor people. (7) Already inflated poverty rates were exasperated by the outmigration of both white and minority non-poor which served first to eliminate mainstream role models, and second to deplete social networks that tied inner ci ties to available job opportunities.

This theoretical framework has stimulated a tremendous research effort in the United States. The most important outcome of this effort has been repeated empirical confirmation of Wilson's main argument -- that poverty concentration has increased in US cities with pernicious consequences for minorities (Bane and Jargowsky, 1991; Nelson, 1991; Massey and Eggers, 1990; Coulton, 1990; Rickets and Sawhill, 1986).[8] However, considerable controversy remains over the role of racial discrimination and Wilson's assertion that the exodus of non-poor minority residents has greatly contributed to the rise of concentrated urban poverty. The second theoretical framework that has been developed to try to provide a fuller understanding of concentrated urban poverty has been advanced by Douglas Massey and Nancy Denton (1993). These authors contend that racism, rather than a specific structural history, is the more impo rtant factor behind the emergence of concentrated urban poverty. Massey and Denton maintain that racial discrimination has been the primary force behind the isolation of minorities in undesirable inner city neighborhoods. Accordingly, racial discrimin ation has also prevented minorities from obtaining the jobs and education necessary to sustain a family over the poverty line. When high levels of racial segregation are then coupled with high aggregate poverty rates, the direct result is concentrated urban poverty.[9]

Concentrated Urban Poverty in Canada

In contrast to the intense American debate stands a Canadian poverty literature that is almost completely devoid of any mention of the underclass or of concentrated urban poverty. The status of concentrated urban poverty in Canadian cities has never been fully explored. Numerous scholars have examined urban poverty and social dislocation (Ross and Shillington, 1989; Ram et al., 1989; Auer and McMullen, 1979; Ray, 1976; McLemore et al., 1975) and numerous others have examined the extent of discri mination in housing, employment and social relations (Li, 1990; Henry and Ginzberg, 1985; Quan, 1979) but few have focused on the issue of the density of poverty. The researchers that do specifically address the issue of the underclass in Canadian cit ies largely argue that Canada does not have a substantive equivalent to the American underclass (Broadway, 1989; Goldberg and Mercer, 1986).[10] However, none of these studies has examined conditions at the neighborhood or census tract level.[11]

I argue and I intend to demonstrate with empirical evidence that this dearth of research is an important oversight, that concentrated urban poverty does exist in Canada, and, finally, that Canada does provide a valid empirical test of American theor ies on concentrated urban poverty. I think the evidence will show that there are more important similarities between the two countries than there are important differences. Similarities in the history of urbanization, in absolute poverty levels, and i n government programs all suggest that Canada should be experiencing concentrated urban poverty. Moreover, the same structures that are purported by Wilson (1991, 1987) and others (Coulton et al., 1990) to lie behind the development of concentrated ur ban poverty in the United States are present in Canada. While the extent of the evidence demonstrating the existence of each of these structural developments varies across cities, I will show that Wilson's specific structural history occurred in certa in Canadian cities and, ultimately, that it is associated with extensive concentrated urban poverty. The parallel structures in Canada and the United States are these: (1) Rapid urbanization and industrialization shaped cities. (2) An influx of immigr ants, who were attracted by industries such as manufacturing and who settled in the city core near industry centers. (3) Manufacturing employment in the core of large, industrial cities declined as factories closed or moved to suburbs and other region s. In turn, the service jobs that replaced manufacturing jobs were accompanied by wages that were too low to maintain families above the poverty line. (4) Selective migration to the suburbs led to significant population losses and increased class segr egation. (5) Governmental programs such as housing policies, highway funding, and urban renewal on the national and local levels served to exacerbate this increasing segregation. (6) A social welfare program that had only marginally reduced high rates of national poverty was unable to bring inner city residents out of poverty either through training or transfer payments. (7) Throughout this history racial and ethnic discrimination served to reinforce social segregation and concentrated urban povert y.

Race in Canada and Its Impact on Concentrated Urban Poverty

Because the role of race has been the focus of much of the debate on concentrated urban poverty in America, I give it special attention here. Although the evidence concerning the existence of racial and ethnic discrimination or racial and ethnic dif ferences in income and quality of life is neither as strong nor as consistent as it is in the US, there is little doubt that discrimination does occur in Canada.[12] There is also little doubt that race and ethnicity play a role in poverty and specifically in concentrated urban poverty in Canada.

However, certain factors dictate that race and ethnicity cannot be the primary factor behind concentrated urban poverty in Canada. The most important of these is that Canada's visible minority[13] population is significantly smaller than that of the United States (3.7 vs 25 percent). In particular, Blacks and Hispanics, the two minorities that make up 21 percent of the total population and 87 percent of the concentrated poor population in Amer ica comprise less than one percent of the Canadian population (Canadian Census, 1986; American Census, 1990; Bane and Jargowsky, 1991). This extremely limited size means that, even if totally segregated, Blacks and Hispanics in Canada could not accoun t for expansive ghettos similar to those that exist in America's central cities.

While Canada does have a diverse ethnic population,[14] census data reveal that most non-visible ethnic minority groups appear to differ only marginally from the median earnings of the entire Canadian population (Elliot and Fleras, 1991; Richmond, 1979). Finally, evidence of discrimination against non-visi ble ethnic minorities in Canada is not as strong as evidence of discrimination against visible minorities (Elliot and Fleras, 1991).

In combination these factors suggest that for the majority of Canada's concentrated urban poor population racial or ethnic discrimination is not likely to play the central role in the development of concentrated urban poverty that it has played in t he United States. However, race and discrimination may be important factors in determining the neighborhoods in which visible minorities do live in Canada's central cities, and ultimately in determining the life chances of those people.

This does not, however, rule out comparisons with American theories of the underclass. As Wilson states, there is nothing in the definition of the underclass that restricts it to minorities. "The concept can be theoretically applied not only to all racial groups, but also to different societies " (Wilson, 1991). Concentrated urban poverty in Canada will have a very different appearance than its counterpart in America. It will exist, not because of strong similarities to an American racial patte rn but because of close parallels with a specific, American structural development pattern.

Structural Similarities

In this section I briefly highlight similarities in the structural development of Canada and the United States to show why concentrated urban poverty should be expected in Canadian cities. Wilson (1987) and other authors cited in this paper have det ailed, both theoretically and empirically, the structural pattern that is purported to have led to concentrated urban poverty in the United States. Therefore, I will avoid lengthy discussions of this specific structural pattern in America. Instead I w ill focus my efforts on providing brief sketches of structural developments in Canada's cities.

The first and perhaps most important of the structural developments purported to be at the root of concentrated urban poverty is rapid urbanization, industrialization, and immigration. Just as they did in the US, cities in Canada grew extraordinaril y rapidly, especially after World War II. Between 1951 and 1971 the average annual growth rate of the urban population of Canada was the highest of all Organization For Economic Cooperation And Development (OECD) countries (Ray, 1976a). Over this peri od, metropolitan Canada nearly doubled in population. An influx of immigrants was associated with this rapid growth and also tied to the development of concentrated urban poverty in both countries. In the years around the turn of the century and after both World Wars hundreds of thousands of immigrants entered Canada, so that by 1971 fully 15.3 percent of the population was foreign born. Sizable populations of poor immigrants entered cities where they were largely concentrated in core areas (Stati stics Canada, 1992). By 1986, fully 30 percent of Canada's inner city population was foreign born, which was almost double the general national average of 16 percent (Ram et al., 1989). The consequence of this process was increased geographic differen tiation based on occupation, race, and ethnicity within Canadian cities.

Industrial decline is the third causal step in theoretical explanations of concentrated urban poverty. Here the evidence is abundant and convincing in both Canada and the United States. Enormous bilateral trade, similar demographics, parallel indust rial structures, comparable worker wages, and roughly equivalent levels of productivity between the two countries all mean that the American economy is an extremely good predictor of its Canadian counterpart (McFate, 1991). Manufacturing decline in th e 1970s was no exception. In the old industrial centres of Canada, manufacturing employment dwindled drastically. The national share of manufacturing in the GDP began to decline in Canada in the 1960s. This decline increased after 1970, until by 1972 Canada's central cities had lost 9.9 percent of their manufacturing employment (Goldberg and Mercer, 1986). The most pronounced drop was in the Quebec-Windsor axis, which had previously accounted for 80 percent of Canada's manufacturing production (Na der, 1976). In particular, Montreal's manufacturing sector experienced some growth in the suburbs and dramatic declines in the city centre (MUCPD, 1973). The result for cities like Montreal and Hamilton was significant increases in the unemployment ra tes within the city core (Morin, 1989; Ray, 1976b). Although many of these manufacturing jobs were replaced by service sector jobs, the wages earned in the service sector were often not sufficient to maintain a family above the poverty line. Thus betw een 1970 and 1985 the median income of inner city families decreased from 70 percent to 62 percent of that of families in the outlying areas (Conseil des Affaires Sociales, 1989).

The reaction to this industrial movement and decline was predictable. Cities on both sides of the border lost selective populations. In the US, the migration was primarily white and largely upper- and middle-class. In Canada, although there was lit tle racial change, the process of migration in the older industrial cities of Canada was similar to that in American cities (Goldberg and Mercer, 1986; Ley, 1981). Over half of Canada's central cities lost significant populations (Statistics Canada, 1 980). In fact, suburbanization, as manifested by population growth in the balance, was more pronounced in Canada (Goldberg and Mercer, 1986). Overall, the percentage of Canada's population living in metropolitan areas grew until 1972 and then began to decline (Ray, 1976a). Between 1951 and 1986 the population of Canada's twelve largest inner cities declined by 37 percent, whereas that of outlying areas increased by 200 percent (Ram et al., 1989). The effect was extremely variable. While newer servi ce-oriented cities like Edmonton grew, older industrial cities like Montreal experienced population decline and economic stagnation (Ley, 1981; Stats Can, 1987). Beginning in 1966, Montreal's city core began to lose population as the outer suburbs exp erienced population gains that were spurred on by middle-class migration (MUCPD, 1973). Already by 1971 the central core's proportion of Montreal's total metropolitan population had decreased by 13 percent. It decreased an additional 11 percent in the next five years. Over a 35 year period from 1951 to 1986 Montreal's inner city population plummeted from 219,700 to 93,000 (Ram et al., 1989). The depreciation of inner-city housing was symptomatic of this industrial decline and population migration. In 1986, 57 percent of the owner-occupied dwellings in inner cities were over 40 years old, compared with only 15 percent in the outlying areas (Ram et al., 1989). In Montreal, as the inner-city lost favor with investors, buildings became obsolete an d unattractive to non-poor families; this intensified the exodus (Wolfe et al., 1980).[15]

The next step toward concentrated urban poverty in both countries was a series of governmental programs and policies that quickened the pace of inner city flight and further magnified the class and racial character of this migration. While most auth ors argue that the development of concentrated urban poverty was largely an outgrowth of private market forces (Mills, 1987), certain governmental programs have reinforced suburbanization of employment and augmented the growing concentration of poor a nd minorities in central cities on both sides of the border. Public housing policies have likely been the most significant factor (Hirsch, 1983). Although Canadian governments were never explicitly racist in their policies, the governments of both cou ntries did assist the growth of concentrated urban poverty by subsidizing[16] suburban home ownership and by concentrating low-rent public housing within central cities (CCSD, 1977; McGeary, 1989). As a result, by 1983, 63 percent of Canadians and 60 percent of Americans were homeowners (Goldberg and Mercer, 1986). In contrast, in 1986 only 14 percent of the dwellings in Canada's inner cities were owned (Ram et al., 1989). Urban renewal was another negative contribution of government policy. In the 1960s Canada followed the United States' lead and enacted large-scale federal slum removal programs. This process further concentrated poverty, as insufficient new low-income housing was produced, and low-incom e residents were forced to relocate into adjacent ghettos (Goldberg and Mark, 1985; Falk, 1976).

There are two additional similarities between the governmental structures of the United States and Canada that are relevant to concentrated urban poverty. First, education, unlike almost all other services, is funded and operated at the local level in both countries, with the exception of the province of Quebec. This greatly increases the incentives for well-off suburbs to screen out low-income immigrants. The second noteworthy parallel is in central city/suburb fiscal disparities. In both count ries, suburbs tend to have a much greater money base than central cities. As measured by municipal per capita revenues or expenditures, the overall fiscal disparity between central cities and suburbs is comparably large in the two countries (Goldberg and Mercer, 1986).

However, there are key differences between the governmental structures of Canada and the United States that may have caused a slight divergence of outcomes. Primary among these is the fragmentation of American municipalities. Whereas there was one governing body for every 2801 Americans in 1979, there was only one governing body per 4954 Canadians (Goldberg and Mercer, 1986). Equally important is the fact that a number of Canadian metropolitan areas have consolidated power in regional or metrop olitan governments that may be better able to coordinate efforts between central cities and suburbs (Magnusson and Sancton, 1983). In contrast, the fragmentation evident in the American urban system may lead to greater differentiation between municipal ities and consequently to a higher percentage of concentrated urban poverty in America.

Related to the fragmentation of American cities is the proliferation of zoning ordinances, which have preserved most suburban residential areas for single-family housing and have effectively screened out the low-income population in the US (Fainstein et al., 1986). This type of exclusionary zoning has also been highlig hted in Canada. However, it is likely that exclusionary zoning is less prevalent in Canada because provinces have maintained jurisdiction over property law (Goldberg and Mark, 1985; Journal of Housing, 1982).

Enduring experience with relatively high national poverty rates is another key element that may be connected to the emergence of concentrated urban poverty in both countries. Comparisons between Canada and the United States often contrast aggregate poverty rates in the two countries (Blank and Hanratty, 1991; Leman, 1980). However, Canada and the US stand together at one end of the rich, industrialized nations in that they both have extended experience with high levels of poverty. Katherine McFate (1991) has demonstrated that Canada and the United States had the h ighest post-transfer poverty rates of any western industrialized nation that she examined.[17] Even those studies that highlight the difference between the poverty rates of the two countries conclude that the poverty rates differ by less than three percent when the same poverty cut-off is used in both countries (Hanratty and Blank, 1992; Blank and Hanratty, 1991). While it is true that Canada's much larger social welfare program has significantly reduced the problem of poverty in that country, it is also clear that post-transfer poverty rates in both countries are relatively high, when com pared to Western European countries. If the Canadian and American governments, like those of many Western European countries, were to decide to devote a greater share of their resources directly to the poor, extensive concentrated urban poverty simply would not exist.

This brief outline of structural patterns in Canada and the United States has shown that the two countries have followed very similar paths. The structural process that served to segment the population by income and race and to create concentrated u rban poverty in the United States is also present in Canada. It follows that concentrated urban poverty may also be present and extensive in Canada.

Expectations

The theoretical framework that explains the growth of concentrated urban poverty in America, should also predict the nature and extent of concentrated urban poverty in Canada. Thus I expect concentrated urban poverty in Canada to be extensive and to be distributed along specific spatial and racial lines. (1) In particular, older manufacturing cities of the Quebec-Windsor axis should be hardest hit. (2) Within this group, cities that have very limited occupational diversification outside of manufacturing should suffer from the most extensive concentrated urban poverty. (3) Provincial poverty rates should also affect this distribution. With poverty rates much higher than those in Ontario, the Atlantic provinces, the Prairie provinces and Quebec should be more prone to concentrated urban poverty. (4) Cities with a high proportion of ethnic minorities should have higher proportions of concentrated urban poverty, and concentrated urban poverty within cities should be associated with the proportion of minorities in a given tract. (5) Cities like Winnipeg wi th a strong regional or metropolitan government should have less intrametropolitan fiscal or legal variance and therefore less severe poverty concentrations. (6) Finally, in terms of the intrametropolitan spatial distribution, I expect that concentrated urban poverty will be located within inner cities near industrial centres where immigrants originally settled, and away from suburban neighborhoods where the more affluent have establ ished residence.

Data

The data used for this paper are from the 1986 Canadian Census, 20 percent sample, and the 1980 American Census. In Canada, unpublished census tract data for all 25 of Canada's consolidated metropolitan areas (CMA) are included in the analysis. Ther e were 64 variables in the Canadian data set which measured either averages or total populations for a variety of racial and socioeconomic characteristics for every census tract in these 25 cities.

I employed cross-tabulations to distinguish between census tracts that suffer from concentrated urban poverty and those that do not. At all times during my analysis I am referring to post- transfer poverty and income. I used a 40 percent poverty cut- off for several reasons.[18] First, this value corresponds with most of the research that has been conducted in the United States (Wilson, 1987; Kirschenman and Neckerman, 1991; Coulton et al., 1990). Second, a forty percent cut-off has been applied to measure only extremely poor neighborhoods. The American census designates tracts with poverty concentrations over 20 percent as low-income areas. A number of other researchers have chosen to apply a 30 percent cut- off after statistical analysis demonstrated a severe threshold at this level (Cohen and Dawson, 1993). Ethnographic work suggests quite strongly that any neighborhood with 40 percent poverty is severely disadvantaged (Anderson, 1991; Kirschenman and Neckerman, 1991). Finally, as the analysis in this article indicates, over half of all concentrated urban poor neighborhoods suffer from conditions over one standard deviation worse than the national average on the following criteria: welfare depe ndency, labor force nonparticipation, and high school dropouts.

The Canadian poverty lines that I used are the standard household Low Income Cut-Offs (LICOs) with a 1978 base. Household, rather than individual or family income, was used to determine poverty levels. There is some discrepancy between Statistic Ca nada's low-income cut-offs and the official poverty lines in the United States. Because the data are aggregated at the tract level it is impossible to compute an equivalent measure in Canada. However, previous research suggests that the differences bet ween poverty lines of the two countries is marginal. In particular, in 1986, the post-transfer poverty rate in Canada was 12.3 percent using the Canadian LICOs with a 1978 base (Ross and Shillington, 1989). This compares to a 1986 Canadian poverty rat e of 11.8 percent using US poverty definitions (Blank and Hanratty, 1991). The difference of 0.5 percent is at best marginal and is unlikely to affect the conclusions in this paper.

Concentrated Urban Poverty in Canada

The first and foremost finding of this study is that concentrated urban poverty is extensive in Canada. As Table 1 reveals, in 1986, in the 25 largest Canadian cities there were 689,175 persons living in areas where poverty concentrations exceeded 40 percent. Within the 225 census tracts that were designated as concentrated urban poverty tracts, there were 313,560 persons who were actually poor. This poor population accounted for fully 1.2 percent of the total national population.

If we compare the Canadian data to the American case, it is obvious that in terms of absolute numbers, concentrated urban poverty is a much greater problem in the United States. In 1980 in just the 100 largest central cities there were 3,673,585 per sons and 1,834,384 poor persons living in concentrated urban poverty in the United States. When every SMSA is included in the analysis, there were almost two and one half million poor persons living in concentrated urban poverty in the US in 1980 (Ban e and Jargowsky, 1991).

However, Table 1 also reveals that, as a percentage of the national population, Canada has more poor persons living under conditions of concentrated urban poverty (1.2 vs 0.8 percent) than does the United States. Even when Canada's 25 largest cities are compared to all US SMSAs, the relationship holds. The 2.5 million concentrated urban poor in all US SMSAs account for 1.1 percent of the total US population, but this figure is still not greater than Canada's 1.2 percent. While the Canadian and American data are not strictly comparable, it is clear that Canada suffe rs from very nearly the same or possibly higher levels of concentrated urban poverty as the United States. Considering the lack of attention this issue receives in Canada this is an extremely surprising finding. It is also an extremely alarming findin g. This is sufficient evidence alone to indicate that concentrated urban poverty is a potentially serious social problem in Canada that deserves immediate attention.

Race, Ethnicity, and Concentrated Urban Poverty in Canada

Although demographics dictate against race and ethnicity being the primary factors behind concentrated urban poverty in Canada, there is considerable evidence to suggest that for Canada's small visible minority population, race will affect the chanc es of living in concentrated urban poverty. Both of these statements are confirmed by Tables 2 and 3.

Beginning with Table 2: we see a strong association between concentrated urban poverty and race in both Canada and the US. In Canada, while the British are greatly underrepresented in concentrated urban poverty areas, the French, Blacks, and Aborig inal Peoples are grossly overrepresented in those same areas. Although the British make up 32.2 percent of the total urban population, they make up only 16.5 percent of the concentrated urban poor. In contrast, the French make up 41.7 percent of the c oncentrated urban poor, but only 29.2 of the total population.

It is quite possible that the high incidence of concentrated urban poverty among the French population is a consequence of ethnic antagonism. It is, however, worth noting that the French population most susceptible to ethnic antagonism (i.e. those l iving in English regions outside of Quebec) are less prone to concentrated urban poverty than the French population living in Quebec. Only 12,820 of the 336,350 French (or 3.8 percent) who live outside of Quebec live in concentrated urban poverty.

The numbers for Blacks and Aboriginal peoples are more disconcerting. While Blacks and Aboriginal peoples make up only 1.5 and 0.8 percent of the total population respectively, these groups comprise 3.0 and 2.8 percent of the concentrated urban poor . Other ethnic groups appear to be fairly evenly distributed between poor and non-poor neighborhoods. With the exception of the Chinese, all other ethnic groups are underrepresented in concentrated urban poverty neighborhoods.

The US case reveals much the same pattern. While Whites comprise 57 percent of the total central city population, they make up only 12 percent of the population in neighborhoods with concentrated urban poverty. Conversely, Blacks and Hispanics are greatly overrepresented in the category of concentrated urban poverty. Asians, with 3.2 percent of the total population, make up only 1.7 percent of the population of concentrated urban poverty areas.

Table 2 illustrates the strong ties between concentrated urban poverty and race in both Canada and the United States, but it also reveals a very important difference regarding the role of race and ethnicity within the two countries. While concentrat ed urban poverty is primarily a White phenomenon in Canada, it almost exclusively a minority problem in the United States. In Canada, Whites comprise 86.3 percent of the population living in concentrated urban poverty. In contrast, this group makes up only 12.1 percent of the concentrated urban poverty population in the United States. Instead, two racial minorities, Blacks and Hispanics, make up the vast majority (87.8 percent) of the population living in concentrated urban poverty in the United States.

Table 3 reinforces the belief that there is a strong connection between race and concentrated urban poverty in both Canada and the United States. The Canadian data illustrate that Aboriginal peoples, Blacks, and French are much more likely to be lo cated in concentrated urban poverty tracts than are British. Similarly in the US, Blacks and Hispanics are much more likely to be situated in concentrated urban poverty than are Whites and Asians. In none of the ethnic or racial groups is a majority of the population located in concentrated urban poverty. However, it is quite evident that Aboriginal Peoples in Canada and Blacks in the United States are by far the worst off with 18.6 percent and 20.0 percent of their populations, respectively, in co ncentrated urban poverty. Ultimately these two tables confirm our earlier expectations about concentrated urban poverty in Canada. On one hand race greatly influences one's chances of living in concentrated urban poverty. On the other hand, most peopl e in concentrated urban poverty are in fact white.

The Social and Economic Characteristics of Concentrated Urban Poverty

While the poverty associated with concentrated urban poverty is an extremely negative phenomenon, much of the concern over concentrated urban poverty rests on its association with a number of negative social dislocations. In Canada evidence does ind icate that there is a strong link between concentrated urban poverty and a variety of social and economic deficiencies. As can be seen in Table 4, concentrated urban poverty neighborhoods differ markedly from other neighborhoods in Canada on almost al l social and economic indicators. While economic conditions are expected to be worse in concentrated urban poverty tracts, the extent of the difference is alarming. Males in concentrated urban poverty are over 20 percent less likely to be employed and over 10 percent more likely to be out of the labor force altogether. Median male earnings drop by nearly one half in concentrated urban poverty tracts. Although the numbers for females and young workers are not as drastic, concentrated urban poverty neighborhoods are significantly worse off in every category.

Perhaps the most alarming feature of Table 4 is the strong welfare dependency that characterizes poor neighborhoods. All neighborhoods receive on average 10 percent of their income from government transfers, but this number more than doubles in con centrated urban poverty tracts, where an average of 24 percent of income comes from government transfers.

The strong correlation between education and concentrated urban poverty should also be noted. While it is impossible to establish a causal direction, it is more than clear that residents of neighborhoods with concentrated poverty have deficient edu cations. The majority of residents in these poor neighborhoods have not completed high school. Table 4 also indicates that the condition of housing stock decreases drastically as you move from the average neighborhood to the average poor neighborhood. Interestingly, immigrant status appears to be only weakly related to concentrated urban poverty.

In sum it becomes quite evident that concentrated urban poverty in Canada means not only being poor, it also means extreme levels of a number of social and economic dislocations. Of all the census tracts designated as areas of concentrated urban pov erty, a slight majority suffered from conditions over one standard deviation worse than the national average on the following criteria: welfare dependency, labor force nonparticipation, and high school dropouts. The implications are quite clear. Conc entrated urban poverty is a serious problem that must be addressed and alleviated.

At the same time it should be noted that further analysis of this population is required before more definitive statements about the long term effects of concentrated urban poverty on either levels of social dislocation or social isolation can be ad vanced. In future research it will be important to undertake both time series analysis and extensive ethnographic research that will determine whether conditions of neighborhood poverty are self- perpetuating and whether residents of concentrated urban poverty are truly isolated and alienated from the rest of Canadian society.

The Spatial Distribution of Concentrated Urban Poverty

This analysis has proved that concentrated urban poverty exists in Canada and that it is an extensive social problem. However, this is only part of the task of this paper. An additional goal of this project is to test theories of concentrated urban poverty that have been developed in the US and to try to provide insight into some of the more enduring debates. To some degree this has already been undertaken. The Canadian case has demonstrated that concentrated urban poverty is not confined to Ame rica and perhaps most importantly that concentrated urban poverty is not exclusively a minority problem. The fact that concentrated urban poverty in Canada appears to have structural roots and does not have race and ethnicity as its primary cause, has already provided some support for the theoretical framework developed by Wilson.

However, if this framework is to be accepted and judged as accurate, it must also be able to explain and predict the spatial distribution of concentrated urban poverty in Canada. The following section will further assess this theoretical framework by outlining and comparing the actual spatial distribution of c oncentrated urban poverty in Canada with the expected distribution that I extrapolated from Wilson's theoretical framework.

The most striking feature of the spatial distribution of concentrated urban poverty in Canada is its regional character. In particular, the province of Quebec, which has roughly one quarter of Canada's total population, was responsible for over half of all Canadians living in concentrated urban poverty. While this is expected given a heavy reliance on manufacturing in Quebec cities and given the high provincial poverty rate, it is still surprising to find numbers this dramatic. The Atlantic prov inces, as anticipated, were also overrepresented, but as a percentage of the total concentrated urban poverty population, they were almost insignificant. Ontario, again as predicted, was strongly underrepresented. The Western provinces had a concentra ted urban poverty population equivalent to their share of the total national population. The close association of aggregate poverty rates with concentrated urban poverty suggests that Massey and Denton (1993) have identified a key variable in the deve lopment of concentrated urban poverty. Table 5 also shows that concentrated urban poverty, as expected, is not strongly correlated with city size. The concentrated urban poverty population was only slightly overrepresented in cities with over 1 millio n residents.

Equally striking in terms of the spatial distribution of concentrated urban poverty were the number of concentrated poor tracts located in Montreal (see Table 6). Of the 225 tracts designated as concentrated urban poverty tracts, 115 were in Montre al. These 115 tracts make up 45 percent of the national population living in concentrated urban poverty and almost 11 percent of the total population of Montreal. Other cities in Quebec also had high proportions of their populations living in concentr ated poverty. Cities in Ontario generally had lower levels of concentrated urban poverty. However, of cities in Ontario, those located in the Quebec-Windsor industrial belt had slightly inflated rates of concentrated urban poverty, which corresponds cl osely with our predictions. Significantly, Winnipeg, with the most consolidated metropolitan government in North America (Artibise and Linteau, 1984) had an unexpectedly high rate of concentrated urban poverty.

Although this paper will not attempt to provide a systematic analysis of the intrametropolitan distribution of concentrated urban poverty, it is clear from a short inspection of the data that concentrated urban poverty is a central city phenomenon. As predicted from Wilson's theory, tracts with poverty concentrations exceeding 40 percent were overwhelmingly located in core areas, often near old industrial sites.

In general, what this spatial distribution has illustrated is that concentrated urban poverty follows many of our theoretical expectations. Older industrial centers of the Quebec-Windsor axis were among the hardest hit. Manufacturing centres in Onta rio were much better off than those in Quebec, but they generally had higher rates of concentrated urban poverty than non-manufacturing based cities in Ontario. Thus manufacturing employment losses do appear to be related to concentrated urban poverty . Provincial poverty rates also appear to have a strong effect on concentrated urban poverty, perhaps even greater than would have been anticipated. While cities in Quebec were by far the most prone to concentrated urban poverty, cities in Ontario wer e among the least prone. In addition, the intrametropolitan distribution of concentrated urban poverty tracts generally matched expectations. Poor tracts were generally located in inner cities and in areas where racial minority concentrations were sli ghtly higher. Finally, it appears that, as anticipated, city size was not a strong determinant of concentrated urban poverty.

However, it also clear that, for most of the measures, the actual distribution only weakly corresponds to our expectations. There are almost as many exceptions as there are rules. For example, while some industry belt cities were heavily hit with c oncentrated urban poverty, others, like Toronto, were not. In some cases expectations did not at all match reality. One of the largest discrepancies between actual and expected distributions was in the effect of political structures. Although certain p olitical structures were presumed to mitigate against concentrated urban poverty, the reality is that political structures seem unrelated to concentrated urban poverty. In particular, Toronto and Winnipeg, two cities with model examples of a unified m etropolitan government, experienced extremely divergent outcomes. The relationship between ethnic diversity and concentrated urban poverty was also not as expected. Although intrametropolitan distributions tended to conform to expectations in that a s trong correlation between minority racial status and concentrated urban poverty was found, the intermetropolitan distribution did not match expectations. Cities like Toronto and Kitchener, with high indices of ethnic diversity, had reduced rates of co ncentrated urban poverty, while cities like Montreal and Chicoutimi, with few minorities, faced severe concentrated urban poverty.

In order to further test the theoretical predictions, I used ordinary least squares regression analysis to compare expected and actual distributions of concentrated urban poverty across Canada's cities. Due to a number of problems associated either with the limited number of cases (25 or less) or with the lack of appropriate data to specify a number of the key independent variables, the analysis provided little meaningful information and is not included in this article. If data that can accurate ly quantify the specific structural history highlighted in this essay become available, more insight into the development of concentrated urban poverty will hopefully be provided by more detailed multivariate analysis.

Implications

Above all else this study has shown that concentrated urban poverty is a serious and extensive problem in Canada. In contrast to other recent empirical studies which have demonstrated that income for Canada's CMAs is on the rise or that Canada's inn er cities are attracting more and more high income families (Stats Can, 1993; Ram et al., 1989), this study has highlighted the fact that a large, concentrated population is being left behind. While cities and even inner cities may be improving on man y social indicators, clearly many neighborhoods in Canada's cities are still suffering. Across the country in 1986 there were 689,175 people living in census tracts with poverty rates exceeding 40 percent. Just less than half of this population, 313,5 60, was both poor and living in concentrated urban poverty. This means that, as a proportion of the national population, Canada has more poor persons in concentrated urban poverty than does the United States, an extremely shocking finding. What is eve n more alarming about concentrated urban poverty in Canada is that tracts that have been designated as concentrated urban poverty neighborhoods are deficient in almost all senses. Concentrated urban poverty in Canada means not only extreme rates of po verty, but also welfare dependency, educational deficiencies, labor force non- participation, and other social dislocations that may lead to a cycle of permanent poverty. Even for those residents who are not poor, the risks stemming from this list of n egative influences increase the chances of being caught in a cycle of poverty. If significant efforts are not implemented and if all the various facets of concentrated urban poverty are not alleviated, this concentrated urban poor population may face not only a debilitating present but also a difficult and unpromising future.

In addition to measuring the extent of concentrated urban poverty in Canada, this study has also attempted to answer the question, " What causes concentrated urban poverty?" Previous theoretical research has suggested two possible answers. First, Massey and Denton (1993) have argued that racial segregation coupled with high aggregate poverty rates is the key to any understanding of the development of concentrated urban poverty. Second, Wilson (1987) has suggested that a complex structural hist ory is at the root of the emergence and growth of concentrated urban poverty. Data from the Canadian case have provided considerable insight into both of these alternatives.

First, this investigation has led to a decidedly mixed response to the debate over the role of racial discrimination in the development of concentrated urban poverty. Race is both an important and an irrelevant factor in Canada's concentrated urban poverty. As Massey and Denton (1993) would have predicted, race greatly influences one's chances of living in concentrated urban poverty. For the small visible minority population that does reside in Canada's cities, race and discrimination appear to be of tantamount importance. Blacks and Aboriginal groups, in particular, appear to be the most disadvantaged. Blacks are almost four times more likely to be found in concentrated urban poverty than are British. Almost one out of every five Aboriginal persons residing in Canada's metropolitan areas lives in concentrated urban poverty. On the other hand, the majority of the concentrated urban poor in Canada are White. For simple demographic reasons, race cannot play the central role in the developm ent of concentrated urban poverty in Canada that Massey suggests it has played in the United States. In short, racial segregation is not the key to understanding concentrated urban poverty in Canada.

Second, it is clear that aggregate poverty rates do help to predict the spatial distribution of concentrated urban poverty in Canada. However, aggregate poverty rates are only a minor part of the story. Neither provincial nor metropolitan poverty ra tes are able to explain the very distinct spatial distribution of concentrated urban poverty within Canadian cities or within Canadian provinces.

Instead, the answer to the question, " What causes concentrated urban poverty?" appears to conform, if imperfectly, to the theoretical framework developed by Wilson (1987). The spatial distribution of the over 600,000 people living in concentrated urban poverty in Canada in 1986 suggests quite strongly that concentrated urban poverty has, at its root, a specific structural pattern that is shared by Canada and the United States. Beginning with an influx of immigrants, rapid urbanization, and th e growth of manufacturing industries and ending with the demise of those same manufacturing centres, concentrated unemployment, and a cycle of social dislocations and poverty, the two countries have shared an almost identical structural history.

Similarly, Canada and America share the same pattern of concentrated urban poverty. In both countries, older industrial centres of the East and Midwest have been most prone to concentrated urban poverty. While the relationship is not perfect, citie s like Montreal, Winnipeg, and Sudbury that have faced extensive manufacturing employment losses, have, at the same time, experienced extensive concentrated urban poverty. Just as concentrated urban poverty has been almost exclusively an inner city pr oblem in the US, the central cities of Canada's metropolitan areas, after suffering heavy losses from migration, have also suffered from high rates of concentrated urban poverty. In short, structural developments appear to be the key to an understandin g of concentrated urban poverty in Canada.

In addition, this paper has tried to determine the role of local governmental structures and policies in the development of concentrated urban poverty. The results on this point are clear. Metropolitan political structures within Canada do not appea r to have influenced the location of concentrated urban poverty in Canada. This does not, however, mean that politics is without influence in the realm of concentrated urban poverty. Strikingly similar political structures and programs in Canada and t he United States at the federal level are likely to have played an integral role in the emergence and growth of concentrated urban poverty on both sides of the border.

Ultimately, this study is only the beginning of a larger investigation of concentrated urban poverty in Canada. A number of important issues remain to be explored. In particular, we do not yet know how rapidly concentrated urban poverty has grown in Canada. Although it would be more time consuming, a time series analysis would be extremely helpful in addressing this question.[19] As well, we need more information concerning the long term effects of living in areas of concentrated urban poverty. While preliminary evidence in the United States suggests that this concentrated poor population is significantly worse off, we need to know how " truly disadvantaged" this Canadian population is. Either time se ries analysis at the individual level or more detailed ethnographic work could help us to understand the depth of social isolation and alienation that exists within this concentrated urban poor population. In addition, it should be emphasized that con centrated rural poverty and its consequences have not been studied here and might prove to be just as dramatic.

Two final points should be quite clear. The problem of concentrated urban poverty is not unique to the United States. Nor is it unique to specific racial minorities. While concentrated urban poverty has been amplified by racial discrimination in Can ada and the US, it is a specific structural history that has led the two countries to share an extensive and alarming problem. It is only through changes to this structure that concentrated urban poverty will truly be alleviated.

Notes

Estimates of the extent of concentrated urban poverty in the United States vary depending on the type and number of urban areas included in the analysis. For accuracy of comparison, this study compares data from Canada's 25 largest C MAs to America's 100 largest central cities. It should be noted that 1980 estimates of the concentrated urban poor population in the US range as high as 2,449,000 when all SMSAs are included in the analysis (Jargowsky and Bane, 1991). Even this larger figure is proportionally smaller than the figure for Canada's 25 largest CMAs. A more detailed account of the specific categories and cutoffs is included in the data section. Back

Poverty of any kind and at any level is a negative phenomenon. However, there is an important distinction to be made between persons who are poor and persons who are living in severely impoverished neighborhoods (Wilson, 1991; Marabl e, 1983). Concentrated urban poverty is particularly alarming and is qualitatively different from individual poverty, because it leads to both extreme levels of poverty, and also a high incidence of lone headship and teenage pregnancy, severe high sch ool dropout and crime rates, and extreme levels of labor force non-participation (Anderson, 1991; Crane, 1991; Jargowsky and Bane, 1991; Coulton et al., 1990; and Ricketts and Sawhill, 1986). While establishing a causal link is difficult, a number of researchers have been able to demonstrate quantitative differences between residents of extremely poor and non-poor neighborhoods. These contextual or " neighborhood effects," which have been demonstrated even after controls for individual socioecono mic status are enacted, exist on such far ranging conditions as dropping out, teenage pregnancy, delinquency, cognitive skills, political alienation and employment (Hajnal, 1995b; Cohen and Dawson, 1993; Crane, 1991a, 1991b; Mayer, 1991; Rosenbaum and Popkin, 1991; and Hogan and Kitagawa, 1985). It should, however, be noted that the magnitude of neighborhood effects has varied considerably from study to study and across different types of behavior (Jencks and Mayer, 1990). More empirical study is required, but it seems clear that, regardless of their individual characteristics, residents of severely impoverished neighborhoods face diminished life chances. Back

Significant empirical analysis of Canada's inner cities has been undertaken by Broadway (1989), Ray (1976), and McLemore et al. (1975), but no study has been able to look systematically at social conditions within areas of concentrat ed urban poverty. Back

Several different definitions for the term " underclass" exist. In this essay, I will follow the approach of the majority of research on the underclass, including that of Wilson (1987), and use spatial concentration as the defining characteristic of the underclass. It should, however, be noted that Jencks (1991) and Ricketts and Sawhill (1986) have proposed numerous other criteria, such as behavioral deficiencies and persistent poverty, to measure the underclass. Back

Detailed accounts of the development of the Black ghetto as it relates to the processes of residential segregation and employment discrimination are provided by Grossman (1989), Hirsch (1983), Kusmer (1976), and Spear (1967). Back

This decline and its effect on the restructuring of the inner city is described in convincing empirical fashion by Goldsmith and Blakely (1991), Kasarda (1989), and Fainstein et al. (1986). Back

Moss and Tilley (1991) provide an excellent account of both the skills and spatial mismatch hypotheses, as well as other possible explanations for the declining position of black men in the labor market. Back

Other debates have taken place over the importance of male joblessness in the creation of female-headed families (Mare and Winship, 1991; Testa, 1990), the role of the skills mismatch for inner city workers (Kasarda, 1990), and the a ccuracy of the spatial mismatch hypothesis (Freeman, 1991; Osterman, 1991; and Ellwood 1986). Back

Massey's argument stems largely from evidence indicating that racial segregation in Northeastern and Midwestern SMSAs has not greatly diminished and that class segregation has not significantly grown (Massey and Eggers, 1990; Massey a nd Denton, 1987). While not directly supporting Massey's hypothesis, Kirschenman and Neckerman's (1991) study of employer attitudes in Chicago lends extremely strong support for the view that racial discrimination is still prevalent. Recent interviews with Wilson suggest that he too considers contemporary racism to be an mportant element in the development of concentrated urban poverty (Reynolds, 1993). Back

Only one study which focused on Montreal and a number of deteriorating rural areas in Quebec suggested that Canadian citizens may be divided into two classes of privileged and under- privileged on the basis of where they live (Gaetan , 1989). Back

Since each of these studies (Broadway, 1989; Goldberg and Mercer, 1986) analyzed aggregate data (i.e. city-suburb comparisons and national averages) each tends to overlook the extreme variation in levels of concentrated urban povert y across neighborhoods that is found in this study. Back

An audit study by Henry and Ginzberg (1985) demonstrated extreme levels of discrimination against Black job applicants. Other studies by Abella (1984) and Goldlust and Richmond (1973) confirm that recent immigrants and minorities e arn significantly less than the non-ethnic white population. A survey conducted in Toronto in 1978 found that the majority of white residents held some degree of racist beliefs (Henry, 1978). Moreover, a large majority of white Canadians (80 percent) believe that visible minorities face racial discrimination (Breton, 1981). On the other hand, most national studies exhibit very limited socioeconomic differences between Canada's various ethnic and racial populations (Elliot and Fleras, 1991). Regres sion analyses conducted on median family income in the 1971 Census showed that when other employment factors were controlled, little variance was explained in terms of language, religion, or ethnicity (Richmond, 1979). Even without any controls, no gr oup other than aboriginal peoples earned less than 90 percent of the median national income in 1971 (Richmond, 1979). While very few studies have looked at geographic isolation, Lowe (1982) found both that Blacks and South Asians were well integrated in Toronto and that they suffered little discrimination in purchasing housing. As well the Canadian Council on Social Development could only find 77 documented cases of racial discrimination in housing in Ontario in 1979 (Quann, 1979). Back

The Canadian government's official category of visible minority includes Aboriginal groups, Hispanics, Blacks, East Indians, and Asians. Back

Ethnicity is measured several ways in the Canadian census. Respondents are asked for their home language, place of birth, and ethnic heritage. Although each of these measures is problematic, ethnic heritage will be the primary measu re in this study. Back

More recent evidence suggests that this exodus had been stemmed and even reversed in the 1980s and 1990s for many inner cities (Ram et al., 1989; Stats Can, 1992). Between 1981 and 1986 the overall inner city population of Canada's 12 largest CMAs increased by 5 percent (Ram et al., 1989). The effects were, however, extremely variable and many central cities continued to lose people into the late 1980s (Stats Can, 1987). Back

This was done in both Canada and the United States on a large scale through such policies as tax deductions of interest on mortgages, mortgage interest rate reduction, and the exemption of capital gains on principal residences (Jour nal of Housing, 1982). Back

This rate is based on the number of families below fifty percent of the country's median income. It should be noted that any comparison among these figures is complicated by the fact that guest workers are generally not included in national statistics in European countries. Back

Of course, not all people living in concentrated urban poverty neighborhoods are poor. Of all the concentrated urban poor census tracts (210), 130 are over 45 percent poor, 69 are over 50 percent poor, 15 are over 60 percent poor, a nd 7 are over 70 percent poor. However, the fact that almost half of the people in a given neighborhood are poor means that all residents of that neighborhood will be surrounded by poverty. Even for the non-poor, this may have considerable consequence s for their life chances (see note 3 for further discussion of this point). Back

Preliminary investigation by the author suggests that the number of concentrated urban poor in Canada has grown rapidly after 1986 (Hajnal, 1995a). Back

References
Abella, Judge Rosalie 1984 Equality in Employment. Ottawa: A Royal Commission Report. Anderson, Elijah 1991 "Neighborhood Effects on Teenage Pregnancy," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Artibise, Alan F.J. and Paul-Andre Linteau 1984 The Evolution of Urban Canada. Winnipeg: Institute of Urban Studies, University of Winnipeg. Auer, Ludwig and Kathryn McMullen 1979 Changes in Poverty in Canadian Metropolitan Centres, 1967-76. Ottawa: Economic Council of Canada Discussion Paper. Auletta, Ken 1982 The Underclass. New York: Random House. Blank, Rebecca M. and Maria J. Hanratty 1991 Responding To Need: A Comparison of Social Safety Nets In The United States And Canada. Draft Paper. Breton, Richard 1981 The Ethnic Community as a Resource in Relation to Group Problems: Perception and Attitudes. Toronto: Centre for Urban and Community Studies. Broadway, Michael J. 1989 "A Comparison of Patterns of Urban Deprivation Between Canadian and US Cities." Social Indicators Research 21: 531-51. The Canadian Council on Social Development 1977 A Review of Canadian Social Housing Policy. Ottawa: CCSD. Cohen, Cathy J. and Michael C. Dawson 1993 "Neighborhood Poverty and African American Politics." American Political Science Review 87: 286-302. Conseil Des Affaires Sociales 1989 Deux Quebec Dans Un: Rapport sur le Developpement Social et Demographique. Quebec: Gaetan Morin. Coulton, Claudia J., Julian Chow, and Shanta Pandey 1990 An Analysis of Poverty and Related Conditions in Cleveland Area Neighborhoods. Cleveland: Center for Urban Poverty and Social Change, Case Western Reserve University. Crane, Jonathan 1991a "Effects of Neighborhoods on Dropping Out of School and Teenage Childbearing," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. 1991b "The Epidemic Theory of Ghettos and Neighborhood Effects on Dropping Out and Teenage Childbearing." American Journal of Sociology 96: 1226-59. Elliot, Jean Leonard and Augie Fleras 1991 Unequal Relations: An Introduction to Race and Ethnic Dynamics in Canada. Scarborough: Prentice-Hall. Ellwood, David T. 1986 "The Spatial Mismatch Hypothesis: Are There Teenage Jobs Missing in the Ghetto?" in R.B. Freeman and H. J. Holzer (eds.). The Black Youth Employment Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Fainstein, Susan S., Norman Fainstein, Richard Child Hill, Dennis Judd, and Michael Peter Smith 1986 Restructuring the City. New York: Longman. Falk, David and Herbert M. Franklin 1976 Equal Housing Opportunity: The Unfinished Federal Housing Agenda. Washington, DC: The Potomac Institute. Freeman, Richard B. 1991 "Employment and Earnings of Disadvantaged Young Men in a Labor Shortage Economy," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Goldberg, Michael A. and Jonathan H. Mark 1985 "The Roles of Government in Housing Policy: A Canadian Perspective and Overview." American Planning Association Journal 85: 34-42. Goldberg, Michael A. and John Mercer 1986 The Myth of the North American City. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press. Goldlust, John and Anthony H. Richmond 1973 A Multivariate Analysis of the Economic Adaptation of Immigrants in Toronto. Toronto: York University Press. Goldsmith, William and Edward J. Blakely 1991 Generations of Poverty: America's Underclass as an Economic and Political Dilemma. Berkeley: University of Berkeley. Grossman, James R. 1989 Land of Hope. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Hajnal, Zoltan L. 1995a Changes in Extreme Poverty Neighborhoods from 1986 to 1991: The Growing Importance of Place in Canada. Presented at the 1995 Canadian Political Science Association Meeting, Montreal. 1995b The Impact of Neighborhood Poverty on Politics: A Comparison of the Political Attitudes and Activities of Whites and African Americans. Presented at the Race, Ethnicity and Urban Poverty Workshop. University of Chicago, January. Hanratty, Maria J. and Rebecca M. Blank 1992 "Down and Out in North America: Recent Trends in Poverty Rates in the United States and Canada." The Quarterly Journal of Economics 25: 233-54. Henry, Frances 1978 The Dynamics of Racism in Toronto. Ottawa: Secretary of State. Henry, Frances and Effie Ginzberg 1985 Who Gets The Work? A Test of Racial Discrimination in Employment. Washington, DC: The Urban Alliance on Race Relations. Hirsch, Arnold 1983 Making the Second Ghetto: Race and Housing in Chicago, 1940-1960. New York: Cambridge University Press. Hogan, D.P. and E.M. Kitagawa 1985 "The Impact of Social Status, Family Structure and Neighborhood on the Fertility of Black Adolescents." American Journal of Sociology 90: 825-55. Jargowsky, Paul A. and Mary Jo Bane 1991 "Ghetto Poverty in the United States," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Jencks, Christopher 1991 "Is the American Underclass Growing?" in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Jencks, Christopher and Susan Mayer 1990 "The Social Consequences of Growing Up in a Poor Neighborhood: A Review," in Michael McGeary and Lawrence Lynn (eds.). Concentrated Urban Poverty in America. Washington, DC: National Academy. Journal of Housing 1982 "Canadian Housing Programs." Journal of Housing (October): 136-40. Kasarda, John D. 1989 "Urban Industrial Transition And The Underclass." The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science: 8-26. Kirschenman, Joleen and Kathryn M. Neckerman 1991 "We'd Love to Hire Them, But: The Meaning of Race for Employers," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.) The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Kusmer, Kenneth L. 1976 A Ghetto Takes Shape. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. Leman, Christopher 1980 The Collapse of Welfare Reform: Political Institutions, Policy, and the Poor in Canada and the United States. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. Ley, David 1981 "Inner City Revitalization in Canada: A Vancouver Case Study." Canadian Geographer 25: 124-48. Li, Peter S. 1990 Race and Ethnic Relations in Canada. Toronto: Oxford University Press. Lowe, Keith D. 1982 Race Relations in Metropolitan Toronto. Toronto, ON: Multiculturalism Directorate, Secretary of State. Magnusson, Warren and Andrew Sancton 1983 City Politics in Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Marable, Manning 1983 How Capitalism Underdeveloped Black America: Problems in Race, Political Economy and Society. Boston: South End Press. Mare, Robert D. and Christopher Winship 1991 "Socioeconomic Change and the Decline of Marriage for Blacks and Whites," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Massey, Douglas S. 1990 "American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of the Underclass." American Journal of Sociology 96: 329-57. Massey, Douglas S. and Nancy A. Denton 1993 American Apartheid: Segregation And The Making Of The Underclass. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1987 "Trends In The Residential Segregation Of Blacks, Hispanics And Asians: 1970-1980." American Sociological Review 52:802-25. Massey, Douglas S. and Mitchell L. Eggers 1990 "The Ecology of Inequality: Minorities and the Concentration of Poverty, 1970-1980." American Journal of Sociology 95: 1153-88. Mayer, Susan 1991 "How Much Does a High School's Racial and Socioeconomic Mix Affect Graduation and Teenage Fertility Rates?" in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. McFate, Katherine 1991 Poverty, Inequality and the Crisis of Social Policy: Public Policy Challenges in the New World Order. Washington, DC: Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. McGeary, Michael G.H. 1989 "Ghetto Poverty and Federal Policies and Programs," in Laurence E. Lynn and Michael McGeary (eds.). Inner- City Poverty in the United States. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. McLemore, Reg, Carl Aass, and Peter Keilhoffer 1975 The Changing Canadian Inner City. Ottawa: Ministry of State for Urban Affairs. Mills, Edwin S. 1987 Non-Urban Policies as Urban Policies. Urban Studies 24: 561-69. Montreal Urban Community Planning Department (MUCPD). 1973 Proposals for Urban Development. Montreal: Planning Department Document. Moss, Phillip and Chris Tilley 1991 Why Black Men Are Doing Worse In The Labor Market: A Review Of Supply-Side And Demand-Side Explanations. New York: Social Science Research Council. Nader, George A. 1976 Cities of Canada: Theoretical, Historical and Planning Perspectives. Toronto: Macmillan. Nelson, Kathryn P. 1991 "Racial Segregation, Mobility and Poverty Concentrations." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America. Osterman, Paul 1991 "Gains from Growth? The Impact of Full Employment on Poverty in Boston," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Quann, Dorothy 1979 Racial Discrimination In Housing. Ottawa, ON: The Canadian Council on Social Development. Ram, Bali, Mary Jane Norris, and Karl Skof 1989 The Inner City in Transition. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services, Statistics Canada. Ray, Michael D. 1976a Canadian Urban Trends: Metropolitan Perspective. Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services. 1976b Canadian Urban Trends: Neighborhood Perspective. Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services. Reynolds, Gretchen 1992 The Rising Significance of Race: Interview with William Julius Wilson. Chicago Magazine (December): 81-85, 126- 30. Richmond, Anthony H. 1979 Ethnic Variation in Family Income and Poverty in Canada. Toronto: Ethnic Research Programme, York University. Ricketts, Erol R. and Isabel V. Sawhill 1986 Defining and Measuring The Underclass. Paper presented to the Changing Domestic Priorities Project. Rosenbaum, James E. and Susan J. Popkin 1991 "Employment and Earnings of Low-Income Blacks Who Move to Middle-Class Suburbs," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. Ross, David P. and E. Richard Shillington 1989 The Canadian Fact Book on Poverty -- 1989. Ottawa: The Canadian Council on Social Development. Spear, Allan H. 1967 Black Chicago. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Statistics Canada 1993 Census Highlights. Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services. 1992a Consolidated Metropolitan Areas and Census Agglomerations: Population and Dwelling Counts. Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services. 1992b The Canada Year Book. Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services. 1986 Canadian Census: 2B and 1A Profiles. Ottawa: Statistics Canada. 1980 Canada's Cities. Ottawa: Statistics Canada. Testa, Mark 1990 Joblessness and Absent Fatherhood in the Inner City. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association. Wacquant, Loic J.D. and William Julius Wilson 1989 "Poverty, Joblessness, and the Social Transformation of the Inner City," in Phoebe H. Cottingham and David T. Ellwood (eds.). Welfare Policy for the 1990s. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Wilson, William J. 1991 "Public Policy Research and The Truly Disadvantaged," in Christopher Jencks and Paul E. Peterson (eds.). The Urban Underclass. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution Press. 1987 The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Wolfe, Jeanne M., Glenn Drover, and Ian Skelton 1980 "Inner-City Real Estate Activity in Montreal: Institutional Characteristics of Decline." Canadian Geographer 24: 349-67.



Back to the Recent Issues Page

Back to CJS Online