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Solving the Many Problems with Inner City Jobs

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Abstract

Inner-city business development is often proposed as a solution to inner-city poverty. However, research evidence suggests that creating new jobs in the inner city is unlikely by itself to significantly increase the employment or earnings of the inner city poor. Public subsidies for inner city business development may be justified by greater environmental, congestion, and fiscal benefits of inner city vs. suburban business location decisions. The research evidence suggests that some boost in inner city business development may be provided by a combination of economic development incentives with enhanced public services. A different set of policies must be used to increase the earnings of the inner city poor. These employment solutions to inner city poverty should include two components; (1) creating more effective labor market intermediaries to make it easier for inner-city residents to find good jobs and for employers throughout the metropolitan area to find good inner city workers; (2) enhancing the job skills of the inner-city poor, particularly their "soft skills", by training programs that have closer ties to employers and incorporate subsidized employment experience. Given the magnitude of the poverty problem, any realistic policy to significantly reduce inner-city poverty through enhanced earnings will require tens of billions of dollars of annual government spending.

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  • Timothy J. Bartik, 2000. "Solving the Many Problems with Inner City Jobs," Upjohn Working Papers 00-66, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research.
  • Handle: RePEc:upj:weupjo:00-66
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    1. Lawrence F. Katz, 1996. "Wage Subsidies for the Disadvantaged," NBER Working Papers 5679, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Timothy J. Bartik, 2003. "Local Economic Development Policies," Upjohn Working Papers 03-91, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research.
    3. Timothy J. Bartik, 1991. "Who Benefits from State and Local Economic Development Policies?," Books from Upjohn Press, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, number wbsle, November.
    4. John Bishop, 1993. "Improving Job Matches in the U.S. Labor Market," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 24(1 Microec), pages 335-400.
    5. Timothy J. Bartik, 2001. "Jobs for the Poor: Can Labor Demand Policies Help?," Books from Upjohn Press, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, number tjb2001, November.
    6. Daniel Immergluck, 1996. "What employers want: Job prospects for less-educated workers," The Review of Black Political Economy, Springer;National Economic Association, vol. 24(4), pages 135-143, June.
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    3. Robert F. Valois & Jelani C. Kerr & Michael P. Carey & Larry K. Brown & Daniel Romer & Ralph J. DiClemente & Peter A. Vanable, 2020. "Neighborhood Stress and Life Satisfaction: Is there a Relationship for African American Adolescents?," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 15(1), pages 273-296, March.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    wages; inner city; earnings; poverty; welfare; labor demand; Bartik;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J4 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets
    • I3 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty

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