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Immigration is another important factor. The Los Angeles and New York regions, whose economies grew strongly in the 1990s, also served as ports of entry for immigrants, with an astounding 1.9 million immigrants moving to those areas between 1990 and 1996 alone.25 Immigrants provide skilled as well as unskilled labor and link cities to the global economy. Cuban immigration, for example, boosted Miamis economy by helping it become a major entrepot for imports from and exports to Latin America. Although immigration boosts growth, large numbers of unskilled, nonunion immigrants also drive down wages and increase inequality. Inequality within regions can be both a cause and an effect of poor regional economic performance. Other things being equal, prosperous regions can reduce inequality by drawing previously unemployed workers into the labor market. Cities with rising average incomes, higher value-added economies, and tight labor markets enjoy declines in ghetto poverty.26 As we discuss later, the booming economy ofthe 19905 was a major cause ofthe decline in concentrated poverty. The causal relationship also works in the other direction: growing inequality within a region can hinder regional economic performance. Regions with large spatial inequalities perform less well. Ledebur and Barnes found that metropolitan areas with higher central citysuburban income disparities had lower employment growth between 1988 and 1991. Hank Savitch and colleagues found that per capita income in fifty-nine central cities was highly correlated (.59) with that of their suburbs, suggesting that centrahcity and suburban economic outcomes rise or fall together.27 In Chapter 3, we examine why suburban prosperity depends, in part, on strong central cities. Despite convergence in hourly wages, regions are becoming more unequal in important respects as advantaged regions prosper and the poor regions languish. This troubling fact alone calls for new national policies. Although interstate wage differences are only a minor cause of rising overall income inequality, it is important to address such diflerences.28 For example, ifl\/lississippi eliminated all spending inequalities among its local school districts, its students would still receive inferior educations compared to states that can afford to spend more on education. Adjusted for cost-of-living differences, per pupil spending in 1997 98 varied from $4,000 in Mississippi to more than $9,000 in New Jersey.29
THE FACTS OF ECONOMIC SEGREGATION AND SPRAWL 43