Economy
Wealth Doesn't Trickle Down, But the Effects of Housing Discrimination Do
From 1990 to 2010, wealth has accumulated in ever-richer neighborhoods, thanks in part to exclusionary housing practices.
The opinion with the greatest impact from the Supreme Court’s latest term may very well be the case that decided the future of fair housing. The Court’s decision last week in Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. Inclusive Communities Project affirms that it is unconstitutional to set housing policies that discriminate implicitly against a protected minority.
This decision is as wide reaching as the court’s mandates on healthcare and marriage equality, yet its impact can be harder to understand. That’s because economic stratification and racial segregation have been built into our neighborhoods over the course of many years, even decades.