Separate and Unequal: Governmental Inequality in the Metropolis

Abstract

The political incorporation and municipal segregation of classes and status groups in the metropolis tend to divorce fiscal resources from public needs and to create and perpetuate inequality among urban residents in the United States. An investigation of data collected for a large number of metropolitan areas in 1960 reveals a number of variables associated with inequality in the distribution of fiscal resources among municipalities in metropolitan areas. The level of income inequality among municipal governments in metropolitan areas varies directly with: location in the South; age, size and density of the metropolis; nonwhite concentration; family income inequality; residential segregation among social classes; housing segregation by quality; and governmental fragmentation. The data provide support for the argument that governmental inequality occupies a central position in the urban stratification system.