The grassroots movement that placed environmental justice issues on the national stage around 1980 was soon followed up by research documenting the correlation between pollution and race and poverty. This work has established inequitable exposure to nuisances as a stylized fact of social science. In this paper, we review the environmental justice literature, especially where it intersects with work by economists. First we consider the literature documenting evidence of disproportionate exposure. We particularly consider the implications of modeling choices about spatial relationships between polluters and residents, and about conditioning variables. Next, we evaluate the theory and evidence for four possible mechanisms that may lie behind the patterns seen: disproportionate siting on the firm side, “coming to the nuisance” on the household side, market-like coordination of the two, and discriminatory politics and/or enforcement. We argue that further research is needed to understand how much weight to give each mechanism. Finally, we discuss some policy options.
This paper reviews the distributional impacts associated with "environmental gentrification" following the cleanup and reuse of Superfund sites, brownfields, and other locally undesirable land uses (LULUs). By making a neighborhood more attractive, cleanup and reuse of LULUs may drive up local real estate prices. Renters in the neighborhood would have to pay higher rents. Although they would also reap a capital gain, homeowners too would face higher housing costs, including perhaps higher tax bills. Moreover, existing residents may not value the removal of the disamenity as much as other households, creating a mismatch between their priorities and the new character of the neighborhood. Thus, even if they do not move, existing residents, especially renters, may be harmed by the gentrification effects of cleanup. If many former residents do move, to be replaced by wealthier households, the character of the neighborhood would change further, feeding the gentrification. Such environmental gentrification is a key concern of local stakeholders. Nevertheless, the extent of environmental gentrification, if any, following cleanup and reuse of LULUs has not been solidly confirmed in the empirical literature. This paper seeks to fill that void by reviewing the evidence to date. We find limited evidence for rising real estate prices following cleanup of LULUs. We find stronger evidence for increased housing density and increasing incomes, but no evidence for racial impacts. Our review also uncovers a variety of factors that are likely to temper the adverse consequences of gentrification for residents.
This paper was begun under the Andrew Young Summer Policy Internship program, under NSF award 0452702. We thank Kelly Bishop, James Marton, and especially Nicolai Kuminoff for comments. The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research. NBER working papers are circulated for discussion and comment purposes. They have not been peerreviewed or been subject to the review by the NBER Board of Directors that accompanies official NBER publications.
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