On models of racial prejudice and urban residential structure

Abstract

Economists have studied the effects of racial prejudice on urban residential structure using a set of models that focus on conditions at the border between the black and white areas. This paper is a review of the theoretical literature on these border models and an investigation of their generality. The main result derived in the paper is that border models are logically inconsistent without unrealistic assumptions either about the incomes of blacks relative to the incomes of whites or about the extent of white prejudice. The paper concludes with several suggestions for more satisfactory modeling of prejudice and urban structure.