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Functional Changes in Urban Economics

Kasarda does not think that the functional changes in urban economics have matched well with the demographic changes. On the functional side, American cities have changed from centers for the production and distribution of material goods to centers of administration, information exchange, and the provision of higherorder services. The functional changes have resulted in adverse changes in both the quality and the size of the employment base. With respect to quality, the relatively high paying production and distribution jobs were not replaced by an equal or greater number of equally or higher paid jobs in administration, information, and services. While many of the newer jobs pay better than most of the older jobs, the average pay of the newer jobs is lower than the average pay for the older production and distribution jobs. Similarly, the total size of the job base subsequent to the functional changes is lower, because fewer jobs were created than were lost.

For the demographic changes to have corresponded well with the functional changes, the cities should have lost a greater proportion of people from the lower socioeconomic groups than from the upper socioeconomic groups. In actual fact, however, just the reverse occurred. The cities gained proportionately more minorities and less well trained people than they gained people from the better trained majority segment of the American population. As a consequence of the mismatch in the changes in American cities, more people are competing for fewer jobs in the lower socioeconomic segments.

Kasarda contended that some population groups suffer in the transformation of the cities because they become separated from the location of the jobs. Kasarda contended further that governmental policies tend to reinforce this situation because governmental subsidies tend to persuade, or at least make it easy, people in the lower socioeconomic groups to remain in the central cities wher...

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Functional Changes in Urban Economics. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 01:03, March 29, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1684020.html