Researcher ORCID Identifier

0009-0008-9781-7637

Graduation Year

2024

Date of Submission

4-2024

Document Type

Open Access Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

History

Second Department

Economics

Reader 1

Tamara Venit-Shelton

Reader 2

David Bjerk

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Terms of Use for work posted in Scholarship@Claremont.

Rights Information

© 2024 Derik Suria

Abstract

I study city-level effects of the federally and state-sponsored urban renewal program that aimed to improve living conditions for residents in blighted areas and slums. I use an interdisciplinary approach to estimate urban renewal effects on measures of income, property value, poverty, and employment. I first replicate the methodology and estimates of urban renewal effects on city outcomes in 1980 from Slum Clearance and Urban Renewal in the United States (Collins and Shester 2013). I extend this research by looking at a longer time horizon (1990, 2000, 2010) and incorporating race-based outcomes. From 1980 to 2010, estimated effects on property value, income, poverty, and employment are positive. Disaggregating by race, urban renewal funding was associated with positive and statistically discernible changes in White and Black income. Estimates for urban renewal effects on Black poverty and employment rates were positive. These changes were robust to changes in demographic composition. I supplement economic analysis with a historical case study of urban renewal in Hyde Park-Kenwood. The politics and incentives motivating urban renewal alongside relocation policies reveal factors, such as mass dispossession, sentimental attachment, and communal bond, that cannot be quantified econometrically, complicating estimate interpretations.

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