Using Targeted Private School Choice to Eliminate Pockets of Persistent Urban Poverty: A Preliminary Assessment

1) Evidence that private school choice expansion (PSCE) can quickly yield economic development and environmental benefits for areas of concentrated poverty could create a pathway around the political gridlock blocking genuine experiments in universal, low-restriction private school choice; 2) The PSCE-development connection raises a lot of questions that may need answers before the implied policy reforms can be optimized and gain widespread acceptance; and 3) Traditional-method-based attacks on persistent urban pockets of severe, concentrated poverty have a disappointing track record. To avoid de facto policy abandonment of large swathes of many cities, we desperately need a dependable, quick, low-cost way to deliver place-focused economic development.