A Measure of Segregation Based on Social Interactions

We develop an index of segregation based on two premises: (1) a measure of segregation should disaggregate to the level of individuals, and (2) an individual is more segregated the more segregated are the agents with whom she interacts. We present an index that satisfies (1) and (2) and that is based on agents' social interactions: the extent to which blacks interact with blacks, whites with whites, etc. We use the index to measure school and residential segregation. Using detailed data on friendship networks, we calculate levels of within-school racial segregation in a sample of U. S. schools. We also calculate residential segregation across major U. S. cities, using block-level data from the 2000 U. S. Census.

• Publication year

  2007

• Venue

  Quarterly Journal of Economics

• Publication date

  2007-05-01

• Fields of study

  Sociology, Economics

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1162/QJEC.122.2.441
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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