Haven't looked at the papers, but surely there are massive covariance problems with these allegedly 'similar' places? And surely the 1950s-60s epidemic of block-busting desegregation brought the black/white house value figure up to 69%, and subsequent persistent redlining brought it back down?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Devine, James" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> That unpredictability is bad news for sociologists looking for causes but good news for economists analyzing consequences. It creates a natural experiment, dividing otherwise similar places into those that had riots and those that did not. ...
From 1940 to 1970, the value of homes owned and occupied by blacks in
central cities jumped to 69 percent of the value of urban homes owned and occupied by whites, from 51 percent. (Home values were rising over this period as well.) By 1990, however, the ratio was down to a mere 53 percent, nearly as low as in 1940.
