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Poverty, crime and education
Unnervingly, poor children seem to fare better in poor neighbourhoods
THE poorest people in Leicester by a wide margin3 are the Somalis who live in the St Matthews housing estate.
Refugees from civil war, who often passed through Sweden or the Netherlands before fetching up in the English Midlands,
they endure peeling surroundings and appalling4 joblessness. At the last census5 the local unemployment rate was three times the national average.
But Abdikayf Farah, who runs a local charity, is oddly upbeat. Just look at the children, he says.
Close to Mr Farah's office is Taylor Road Primary School—which, it turns out, trumps6 almost every school in Leicester in standardised tests.
Its headmaster, Chris Hassall, credits the Somali immigrants, who insist that their children turn up for extra lessons at weekends and harry7 him when they seem to fall behind.
Education is their ticket out of poverty. Poor district, wonderful school, well-ordered children: in Britain, the combination is not as unusual as one might suppose.
Britain has prized the ideal of economically mixed neighbourhoods since the 19th century. Poverty and disadvantage are intensified8 when poor people cluster, runs the argument;
conversely, the rich are unfairly helped when they are surrounded by other rich people. Social mixing ought to help the poor.
It sounds self-evident—and colours planning regulations that ensure much social and affordable9 housing is dotted among more expensive private homes.
Yet “there is absolutely no serious evidence to support this,” says Paul Cheshire, a professor of economic geography at the London School of Economics (LSE).
And there is new evidence to suggest it is wrong. Researchers at Duke University in America followed over 1,600 children from age five to age 12 in England and Wales.
They found that poor boys living in largely well-to-do neighbourhoods were the most likely to engage in anti-social behaviour,
from lying and swearing to such petty misdemeanours as fighting, shoplifting and vandalism, according to a commonly used measure of problem behaviour.
Misbehaviour starts very young (see chart 1) and intensifies10 as they grow older.
Poor boys in the poorest neighbourhoods were the least likely to run into trouble. For rich kids, the opposite is true:
those living in poor areas are more likely to misbehave.
The researchers suggest several reasons for this. Poorer areas are often heavily policed, deterring11 would-be miscreants;
it may be that people in wealthy places are less likely to spot misbehaviour, too.
Living alongside the rich may also make the poor more keenly aware of their own deprivation12, suggests Tim Newburn,
a criminologist who is also at the LSE. That, in turn, increases the feelings of alienation13 that are associated with anti-social conduct and criminal behaviour.
Research on England's schools turns up a slightly different pattern. Children entitled to free school meals—a proxy14 for poverty—do best in schools containing very few other poor children,
perhaps because teachers can give them plenty of attention. But, revealingly, poor children also fare unusually well in schools where there are a huge number of other poor children.
That may be because schools have no choice but to focus on them. Thus in Tower Hamlets, a deprived east London borough15, 60% of poor pupils got five good GCSEs (the exams taken at 16) in 2013; the national average was 38%.
Worst served are pupils who fall in between, attending schools where they are insufficiently16 numerous to merit attention but too many to succeed alone (see chart 2).
Mr Cheshire reckons that America, too, provides evidence of the limited benefits of social mixing.
Look, he says, at the Moving to Opportunity programme, started in the 1990s, through which some poor people received both counselling and vouchers17 to move to richer neighbourhoods.
Others got financial help to move as they wished, but no counselling. A third group received nothing. Studies after 10-15 years suggested that the incomes and employment prospects18 of those who moved to richer areas had not improved.
Boys who moved showed worse behaviour and were more likely to be arrested for property crime.
In Britain, this pattern might be partly explained by the existence of poor immigrant neighbourhoods such as St Matthews in Leicester.
The people who live in such ghettos are poor in means, because they cannot speak English and lack the kind of social networks that lead to jobs, but not poor in aspiration19.
They channel their ambitions through their children.
Another probable explanation lies in the way that the British government hands out money.
Education funding is doled20 out centrally, and children in the most indigent21 parts tend to get the most cash.
Schools in Tower Hamlets receive 7,014 ($10,610) a year for each child, for example, compared with the English average of 4,675.
Secondary schools also get 935 for each poor child thanks to the “pupil premium” introduced by the coalition22 government.
Meanwhile Teach First sends top graduates into poor schools. In America, by contrast, much school funding comes from local property taxes, so those in impoverished23 areas lose out.
As the Duke University researchers are keen to point out, all this does not in itself prove that economically mixed neighbourhoods are a bad thing.
They may be good in other ways—making politicians more moderate, for example. But the research does suggest that the benefits of such districts are far from straightforward24.
Patterns of social segregation25 reflect broader social inequality, argues Mr Cheshire, who has written a book about urban economics and policy.
Where mixed neighbourhoods flourish, house prices rise, overwhelmingly benefiting the rich. Spending more money on schools in deprived areas and dispatching the best teachers there would do more to help poor children.
Assuming that a life among wealthy neighbours will improve their lot is too complacent26.
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1
paradox
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| n.似乎矛盾却正确的说法；自相矛盾的人(物) | |
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2
ghetto
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| n.少数民族聚居区，贫民区 | |
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margin
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| n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘 | |
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4
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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census
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| n.(官方的)人口调查，人口普查 | |
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6
trumps
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| abbr.trumpets 喇叭；小号；喇叭形状的东西；喇叭筒v.（牌戏）出王牌赢（一牌或一墩）( trump的过去式 )；吹号公告，吹号庆祝；吹喇叭；捏造 | |
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7
harry
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| vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼 | |
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8
intensified
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| v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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9
affordable
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| adj.支付得起的，不太昂贵的 | |
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intensifies
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| n.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的名词复数 )v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的第三人称单数 ) | |
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11
deterring
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| v.阻止，制止( deter的现在分词 ) | |
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12
deprivation
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| n.匮乏；丧失；夺去，贫困 | |
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alienation
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| n.疏远；离间；异化 | |
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proxy
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| n.代理权，代表权；（对代理人的）委托书；代理人 | |
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borough
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| n.享有自治权的市镇；(英)自治市镇 | |
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insufficiently
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| adv.不够地，不能胜任地 | |
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vouchers
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| n.凭证( voucher的名词复数 )；证人；证件；收据 | |
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prospects
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| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
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aspiration
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| n.志向，志趣抱负；渴望；(语)送气音；吸出 | |
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doled
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| 救济物( dole的过去式和过去分词 )； 失业救济金 | |
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indigent
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| adj.贫穷的，贫困的 | |
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22
coalition
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| n.结合体，同盟，结合，联合 | |
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23
impoverished
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| adj.穷困的，无力的，用尽了的v.使（某人）贫穷( impoverish的过去式和过去分词 )；使（某物）贫瘠或恶化 | |
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24
straightforward
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| adj.正直的，坦率的；易懂的，简单的 | |
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25
segregation
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| n.隔离，种族隔离 | |
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26
complacent
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| adj.自满的；自鸣得意的 | |
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