Next Article in Journal
Volunteering, Social Trust and Life Satisfaction of the Young-Old in China: Based on Urban-Rural Differences
Previous Article in Journal
The Propensity for Parenthood in Italy Between Cultural Orientations, Individual Choices, and Welfare Policies
Previous Article in Special Issue
Stationarity and Types of Internal Migration of Selected Foreign Groups: Insights from Italy
 
 
Search for Articles:
Title / Keyword
Author / Affiliation / Email
Journal
Article Type
 
 
Advanced Search
 
Section
Special Issue
Volume
Issue
Number
Page
 
Journals
Social Sciences
Volume 14
Issue 3
10.3390/socsci14030149
socsci-logo
Submit to this Journal Review for this Journal Propose a Special Issue
► Article Menu

Article Menu

share Share announcement Help format_quote Cite question_answer Discuss in SciProfiles
first_page
settings
Order Article Reprints
Font Type:
Arial Georgia Verdana
Font Size:
Aa Aa Aa
Line Spacing:
Column Width:
Background:
Article

Staying or Moving: Racial Differences in Single Mothers’ Residential Stability

by
Ryan Gabriel
1,*,
Peter Polhill
2 and
Adrienne Waite
1
1
Department of Sociology, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602, USA
2
ILR School, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Soc. Sci. 2025, 14(3), 149; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14030149
Submission received: 30 July 2024 / Revised: 17 February 2025 / Accepted: 27 February 2025 / Published: 28 February 2025
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Exploring Residential Mobility in a Changing Society)
Browse Figure
Versions Notes

Abstract

:
In this study, we investigate the residential stability and mobility patterns of Black single mothers compared to White single mothers. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics from 1970 to 2015, linked to the U.S. Census for contextual characteristics, our multilevel linear probability models reveal substantial racial disparities. Black single mothers have a lower probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods rather than migrating to poor neighborhoods relative to White single mothers. Conversely, Black single mothers possess a higher probability of remaining in poor neighborhoods instead of moving to non-poor ones in relation to White single mothers. When economic resources are allowed to vary between Black and White single mothers, even higher-income Black single mothers cannot convert these resources into remaining in or migrating to non-poor neighborhoods at the same rate as White single mothers.

1. Introduction

Black single mothers in the United States have long been a focal point of political discourse and social scientific inquiry. This is largely due to their disproportionate likelihood of residing in impoverished neighborhoods and the fact that the neighborhood trajectories of Black households in these contexts often display significant temporal inertia, as they tend to remain in disadvantaged spaces for extended periods (Lee et al. 2017). Historically, discussions on Black single mothers were frequently marred by empirical limitations, gender biases, and reductive cultural explanations for the prevalence of such households within Black communities (Frazier 1968; Moynihan 1965). In contrast, contemporary scholarship has evolved to offer more nuanced theoretical frameworks of Black life (Anderson 2015; Bonilla-Silva 2019; Emirbayer and Desmond 2015; Hunter and Robinson 2016; Massey and Denton 1993; Wilson 1987) while employing more robust methodological approaches (Desmond 2016; South and Crowder 1998) to examine Black single-mother families and their interactions with social institutions.
This contemporary scholarship finds that the neighborhoods these families reside in tend to be highly segregated by race and often suffer from high rates of crime, pollution, and mortality, as well as a lack of employment opportunities, green spaces and access to healthy food options (Crowder and Downey 2010; Do et al. 2013; Gordon et al. 2011; VonLockette 2010; Sharkey and Sampson 2010; Wolch et al. 2005). These conditions pose challenges for single mothers, who, due to the intersecting burdens of being single, experiencing gendered social disadvantages, and having caregiving responsibilities, might rely more heavily on neighborhood-based resources for support—resources that are frequently scarcer in disadvantaged neighborhoods (Massey and Denton 1993; Stack 1974). Their exposure to these spaces not only shapes their own well-being but that of their children (Broussard 2010). These deleterious contexts frequently mean children attend low-performing schools, encounter gangs, and develop behavioral problems (Harding 2010; Kim et al. 2019; Morrissey and Vinopal 2018). Growing up in such environments also affects children’s cognitive development and educational attainment, likely reducing the possibility they escape poor neighborhoods as adults (Sharkey and Elwert 2011; Wodtke et al. 2011). This intergenerational transmission of place-based disadvantage underscores the importance of understanding the lives of single-mother families living in these contexts.
While scholars have highlighted the challenges faced by Black single mothers and their children (Desmond 2012; Desmond 2016), and investigated Black-White differences in these challenges (South and Crowder 1998), there is still much to understand about how they are stratified in society and their responses to that stratification. This lack of knowledge is particularly acute as it relates to understanding racial differences in single-mother families in the housing market. Previous quantitative scholarship on the topic has been primarily concerned with assessing Black and White single mother differences in residential mobility into and out of non-poor and poor neighborhoods (South and Crowder 1998). However, considering racial differences in residential stability offers a complementary frame that highlights the constancy of single-mother families remaining in both non-poor and poor neighborhoods. This perspective stresses how exposure to neighborhood disadvantage can endure when single-mother families are unable to achieve residential stability in resource-rich spaces.
Another critical aspect that previous research has overlooked in assessing the residential stability and mobility patterns of Black single mothers compared to their White female peers (South and Crowder 1998) is whether there are group differences in how economic resources are associated with their ability to remain in non-poor neighborhoods or migrate out of poor ones. Such an analysis is essential to determine whether, in addition to having lower wages (Pettit and Ewert 2009), Black single mothers can convert their economic resources into improved neighborhood contexts as effectively as White single mothers. Given the centrality of economic resources in conditioning where households live, this investigation is particularly pressing for these families.
Therefore, in this study, we use longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) linked to the U.S. Census to assess the residential stability and mobility patterns of Black single mothers from 1970 to 2015 compared to White single mothers. We apply multilevel linear probability models to investigate racial differences in patterns of residential stability in both non-poor and poor neighborhoods, as well as the role that economic resources play in these differences. Our study provides an increased understanding of Black single mothers’ patterns of residential stability and mobility, emphasizing how economic resources shape these patterns, while revealing the persistent racial disparities that leave White single mothers better positioned to secure residence in non-poor neighborhoods. By highlighting these inequities, our findings inform policies aimed at reducing racial gaps in housing opportunities and outcomes.

2. Background and Theory

2.1. Black Single Mothers and Urban Poverty: A Brief History

Sociologist E. Franklin Frazier spent much of his intellectual life investigating the Black experience in America. In speaking to Black life in the urban North during the 1936 Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association, he observed high rates of “family disorganization” among this population. To explain this pattern of family disorganization, he suggested that a matriarchal family structure developed in the South due to the destabilizing effects of slavery and was brought to the urban North during the first Great Migration. According to Frazier (1968), Black single mothers met the “competitive life of the city” where these households encountered a “severe struggle for survival” and were “subjected to the disintegrating forces in the urban environment.” Despite Frazier recognizing the contextual challenges that the urban North had on the lives of Black single mothers, he misattributed slavery as a prominent cultural contributor to the high frequency of Black single-mother families in northern cities. This misattribution has been corrected by empirical evidence, where Tolnay (2001) observed that during the first Great Migration in 1920, Black southern migrant and northern non-migrant children were equally likely to live with both parents, a finding distinctly counter to Frazier’s opinion.
Frazier’s faulty cultural explanation for Black single-mother families influenced future scholarship, including scholars like Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1965) who blamed Black single-mother families for the poverty in these areas and pathologized Black familial culture as deficient, attributing it to an intergenerational transmission of family structure from the slavery era. Moynihan argued that many Black neighborhoods were caught in a “tangle of pathology,” that included low educational attainment, high unemployment rates, and welfare dependency—largely stemming from matriarchal family structures. Scholars rigorously critiqued a variety of Moynihan’s assertions about the causes of impoverished Black neighborhoods, such as William Julius Wilson (1987) who asserted that, instead of attributing mother-headed families as one of the primary causes of impoverished Black neighborhoods, that social scientists should turn their attention to structural causes of urban poverty such as deindustrialization and the decline of employment in the manufacturing sector. Further scholarship followed Wilson in emphasizing the importance of structural causes of impoverished Black neighborhoods, particularly the role of residential segregation. For example, Massey and Denton (1993) detailed that Black households had been highly segregated in America’s cities even after the 1968 Fair Housing Act, resulting in a preponderance of predominantly Black neighborhoods marked by high poverty rates.

2.2. Theories of Racial Residential Stratification

The scholarship of Wilson and others has added more nuance to our understanding of the causes and consequences of impoverished Black communities, where the focus on Black single mothers being a main driver of poverty in these areas has diminished. Nevertheless, the share of children in Black mother-only families has remained persistently high, when in 1980, 43% of Black children were in these living arrangements, and by 2015, 49% lived in such households (US Census Bureau 2023). The temporal duration of this family structure points to the importance of deepening our understanding of their lives, particularly their patterns of residential stability and mobility, given that the neighborhoods they occupy can have a significant impact on their life course outcomes (Galster and Sharkey 2017; Sharkey and Faber 2014). To do so, we can apply a variety of theoretical arguments to inform our investigation of racial differences in single mothers’ residential stability and mobility patterns. One such theory is the spatial assimilation theory (Massey and Mullan 1984). The spatial assimilation theory asserts that as individuals increase their socioeconomic resources—through factors such as employment, education, and income—they are more likely to migrate to and remain in non-poor neighborhoods. One of the challenges that many Black single mothers encounter in attaining and remaining in non-poor neighborhoods is that they often possess lower levels of socioeconomic resources. By way of example, in their 2017 article, Damaske et al. observed that the poverty rate for Black single mothers grew from 30.4% in 2001 to 46.2% in 2010 (Damaske et al. 2017). Furthermore, Black-White differences in wages among women were 5% in 1979 but grew to 15% by 2005 (Pettit and Ewert 2009).
When scholars apply the spatial assimilation theory, they tend to find that it predicts the residential outcomes of White and Asian households, but fails when applied to Black and, to a lesser extent, Hispanic households (Charles 2003; South and Crowder 1997; South et al. 2005). For Black single mothers, South and Crowder (1998) found that between 1979 and 1985, controlling for socioeconomic attributes did not fully account for their higher likelihood of moving into poor neighborhoods and falling out of non-poor ones compared to White single mothers. These racial differences lead some researchers to posit an alternate theory known as place stratification (Alba and Logan 1991; Logan and Molotch 1987). With this theory, discriminatory forces are thought to have created a dual housing market that distinctly disadvantages Black households (Faber and Drummond 2024). Evidence for a racially differentiated housing market ranges from racial steering by real estate agents (Turner et al. 2013) to non-exclusionary discrimination where, for example, landlords treat Black renters poorly (Roscigno et al. 2009). In an audit study, Massey and Lundy (2001) found that poor Black women were more likely to encounter higher levels of discrimination from rental agents: they were assessed higher application fees, experienced more frequent questioning of creditworthiness, and were told about fewer units than their White female counterparts. Another challenge that Black women at the bottom rung of the housing market experience is eviction. Using eviction filings from 2012 to 2016, Hepburn and colleagues (2020) found that Black women renters had an eviction filling rate of 6.4 percent, nearly twice that of White women renters (Hepburn et al. 2020).
The place stratification theory diverges from the spatial assimilation theory by emphasizing racial disparities in the effect of socioeconomic resources on the ability of households to remain in or migrate to non-poor neighborhoods. Specifically, scholars have proposed two variants of the place stratification theory: the weak and the strong versions (Alba and Logan 1993). When applied to Black and White single mothers, the weak version argues that socioeconomic resources have a greater influence on improving neighborhood outcomes for Black single mothers than for their White single mother peers. Despite this, even the most socioeconomically advantaged Black single mothers are predicted to be unable to access neighborhoods that are attainable for similarly resourced White single mothers. The strong version contends that systemic barriers prevent Black single mothers from effectively leveraging their socioeconomic resources to achieve residential outcomes comparable to those of White single mothers. Consequently, socioeconomic resources have a more substantial impact on White single mothers’ chances of attaining and maintaining residence in non-poor neighborhoods than Black single mothers.
Due to a relatively scant amount of research on the residential mobility patterns of Black and White single mothers, we have a lack of evidence on how the weak and strong versions of this theory function for these groups. Prior scholarship on the weak and strong versions of the place stratification theory also provides little guidance given that findings have been relatively mixed. For instance, South et al. (2005) observe that Black households are more likely to follow the weak version in that the costs of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods are higher for them than for White households. Conversely, Pais and colleagues (2012) find that Black households across metropolitan areas are slightly more likely to follow the strong version of the theory when the outcome is neighborhood average family income. Despite the limited guidance we receive from past research, scholarship on Black-White differences in residential mobility (Spring et al. 2017), neighborhood attainment (Pais et al. 2012), neighborhood trajectories (Huang et al. 2021; Lee et al. 2017; South et al. 2016), housing searches (Christensen and Timmins 2022), and eviction (Desmond 2012) compellingly supports the idea that a dual housing market exists between Black and White single mothers. These studies, while not a complete representation for racial stratification in the housing market, highlight the need for further investigation into how economic resources are associated with these families’ exposure to non-poor and poor neighborhoods.
Scholars have also posited that individual preferences are a major determinant shaping racial differences in residential mobility. Often studied in the context of desires for neighborhoods with certain racial compositions (Charles 2003), scholars have asserted that racial groups prefer neighborhoods with large shares of their own racial group (Charles 2006). Yet, given that neighborhood racial composition is closely linked with neighborhood socioeconomic status (Firebaugh and Farrell 2016), this preference for racial homogeneity may lead Black households to be more likely to remain in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods (Ackert et al. 2019). For White households, however, this may be associated with patterns of White flight, or out-migration away from poorer neighborhoods because of their higher shares of people of color (Pais et al. 2009).
Moreover, patterns of residential stability and mobility can be influenced by life-cycle characteristics and social network ties (Rossi 1955; Spring et al. 2017). While not exhaustive, life-cycle characteristics can include household size, age structure, family composition, housing tenure, and length of residence. For single mothers, the number and age of their children could influence their propensity to remain in either non-poor or poor neighborhoods since families with more and younger children could have higher rates of residential instability (Coulton et al. 2012; Desmond 2016). Regarding the latter, having more children could increase household crowding, potentially prompting single mothers to find larger accommodations. Conversely, older single mothers, those who own homes, and families that remain in their homes for extended periods may be more residentially rooted and, therefore, less likely to migrate.
Furthermore, single-parent families could be more reliant upon social networks for support, and scholarship has indicated that kin can play a role in rooting individuals in place. By way of example, Ackert et al. (2019) found that Black as compared with White households are more likely to have kin living near them and to have their kin reside in poor neighborhoods. In conjunction with that, they observed that when Black households have kin living in poor neighborhoods, they are less likely to egress from those areas and are more likely to ingress into those spaces. Moreover, time spent in a neighborhood can promote strong social ties beyond kin, extending to kith. Research has shown that Black single mothers who reside in poor neighborhoods often develop strong social ties with neighbors (Stack 1974). These reciprocal relationships can help mitigate the effects of poverty while enhancing community solidarity (Ladner 1971; Stack 1974). Having such relationships and organized networks in the face of concentrated poverty challenge the notion of Black single mothers being solely acted upon by socio-structural arrangements that disadvantage them. Instead, this research characterizes these households as rational actors in the context within which they are located (Hunter and Robinson 2016). Although the specific role that social network ties have with the residential stability and mobility patterns of single mothers cannot be fully disentangled with existing data, conceptually understanding how kith and kin networks potentially influence these patterns is important for appreciating how these families function in the housing market.
Additionally, the residential stability and mobility of single-mother families occur within a broader spatial context (Rérat 2020). One of the most immediate spatial contexts for single-mother families is their neighborhood. The theory of neighborhood effects posits that the characteristics of neighborhoods are related to the outcomes of individuals living within them (Galster and Sharkey 2017; Sampson 2012; Sampson et al. 2002). For single mothers, their likelihood of residing in either non-poor or poor areas may be shaped by neighborhood characteristics such as homeownership rates, since higher levels of homeownership are often associated with lower population turnover. At the metropolitan level, the housing availability model (South and Crowder 1997) suggests that characteristics at this level influence the types of neighborhoods available and, in turn, are associated with patterns of residential stability and mobility. For single-mother families, remaining in non-poor or poor neighborhoods is likely tied to broader metropolitan features, such as the level of Black-White segregation, which is associated with the racial concentration of neighborhood poverty, and the share of Black residents in a metropolitan area, which correlates with higher poverty rates (Massey and Denton 1993). Furthermore, higher metropolitan poverty rates are often linked to a greater stock of poor neighborhoods, while larger population sizes may correspond to greater income inequality (Jargowsky 1996). The share of recently built housing tends to increase the number of non-poor neighborhoods, as new housing is frequently non-poor (Dwyer 2007), whereas higher levels of vacant housing are typically indicative of metropolitan decline, contributing to a greater concentration of poor neighborhoods (Wang and Immergluck 2019). Accounting for these intersecting factors at the neighborhood and metropolitan levels is important when investigating racial differences in single-mother families’ patterns of residential stability and mobility.
The collection of previous scholarship and theoretical arguments presented thus far lead us to three foundational research questions that culminate in our main research question. The three foundational research questions are:
  • How do Black single mothers compare to White single mothers in their probability of staying in non-poor neighborhoods rather than moving to poor neighborhoods?
  • How do Black single mothers compare to White single mothers in their probability of staying in poor neighborhoods rather than moving to non-poor neighborhoods?
  • Does controlling for racial differences in socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics account for racial differences in who stays in non-poor or poor neighborhoods?
Analyzing these three research questions establishes key racial comparisons in the residential stability and mobility patterns of single mothers while accounting for theoretically relevant characteristics. However, they do not address whether economic resources are associated with differential patterns of residential stability and mobility for Black and White single mothers, as posited by the weak and strong versions of the place stratification theory. This leads us to our main research question, which is:
4.
Does the probability of remaining in non-poor or poor neighborhoods for Black and White single mothers vary by economic resources?
In sum, this investigation will shed light on the unique challenges faced by Black single mothers, who have historically been marginalized in the housing market, while broadening our knowledge of Black and White single-mother families as a whole and informing policies aimed at fostering upward mobility.

3. Materials and Methods

For our analysis, we use the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (2024) from 1970 to 2015 linked to the U.S. Census for contextual characteristics. The PSID began in 1968 with a panel of approximately 4800 U.S. families, initially interviewed annually until 1997 and biennially thereafter. As members of the original panel families established separate households, they were incorporated into the panel. The PSID offers a variety of strengths for the study of residential stability and mobility, particularly through its extensive data on individual and household characteristics. The PSID also includes restricted-access Geospatial Match Files. These files allow us to attach neighborhood characteristics to PSID respondents through the Neighborhood Change Database (NCDB) (GeoLytics 2013). The NCDB standardizes census tracts, which we conceptualize as neighborhoods (see White 1987), from 1970 to 2010 to align with 2010 census tract boundaries. Census tracts are designed to have approximately 4000 individuals, with the average population size within tracts in our study being 4386.70. We only include tracts in census-defined Metropolitan Statistical Areas, meaning that tracts in rural areas are not included in our sample. We use linear interpolation based on NCDB census data from 1970 to 2010 to estimate neighborhood and metropolitan characteristics during non-census years.
The longitudinal design of the PSID allows us to segment single-mother families into a series of family-period observations. Each family-period observation represents the one- to two-year gap between PSID interviews. We have a total of 15,354 family-period observations included in our sample. We compare two types of single-mother families: non-Hispanic Black single mothers (N = 11,588) and non-Hispanic White single mothers (N = 3766) (hereafter Black or White). The mothers in our sample are single at both the beginning and end of the observation period and we restrict our sample to Black and White individuals due to the limited representation of other racial groups in the PSID.

3.1. Dependent Variables

We treat residential stability and mobility as a binary process where respondents make either a decision to stay or move neighborhoods. We have two different binary dependent variables. The first dependent variable is whether a single-mother family remained in a non-poor census tract or moved to a poor tract between PSID interviews. The second dependent variable is like the first, but it measures whether a single-mother family remained in a poor census tract or moved to a non-poor tract between interviews. Congruent with prior studies (Ackert et al. 2019; Jargowsky 1997), we define non-poor neighborhoods as tracts with poverty levels below 20% and poor neighborhoods as tracts with poverty rates at 20% and above.

3.2. Independent Variables

Our models control for a set of socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, along with a suite of contextual characteristics that are theoretically associated with single-mother family differences in residential stability and mobility. We incorporate the socioeconomic variables of family income measured in constant 2010 dollars, years of education completed by the household head, their employment (1 = yes) and homeownership status (1 = yes). We include the demographic variables of age of the household head, persons per room, and whether they lived in the same house for three plus years at the beginning of the observation period (1 = yes). We include measures for the average age of children and the number of children in the household.
We also add a variety of contextual characteristics. At the neighborhood level, we include a measure for the percentage of homeowners. At the metropolitan level we include the Black-White dissimilarity index, the percentage of Black individuals, percentage living below the poverty line, the natural log of the population size, the percentage of housing built in the last 10 years, and the percentage of vacant housing. We also include a variable for the year of observation and another variable for length of observation to account for the PSID’s switch from an annual to biennial interview schedule.

3.3. Analytic Strategy

With the PSID’s longitudinal design, families are interviewed serially across the life course. In turn, we segment each family’s data into a series of family-period observations, where each family’s observations are associated with either the one- or two-year period between PSID interviews. Since PSID family-periods are nested within families and families are nested within metropolitan areas, the regression assumption of stochastic independence of error terms is violated. We address this through the use of a multilevel modeling approach, which adjusts for the hierarchical structure of the data.
In the first stage of our investigation, we estimate three-level random-intercepts linear probability models to predict the probability that single-mother families will remain in a non-poor neighborhood rather than migrate to a poor neighborhood between PSID interviews. For the second stage, we apply the same modeling strategy and predict the probability that single-mother families will remain in a poor neighborhood instead of moving to a non-poor one between interviews. In both the first and second stage of our analysis, we are substantively interested in the fixed-effects coefficients and not the variance components that describe the variance in the dependent variable attributable to each level of the hierarchy.
For the first and second stages of our investigation, presented in Tables 2 and 3, respectively, we apply a stepwise modeling strategy. We begin in Model 1 with a relatively naïve model that includes the focal independent variable of single-mother status by race, a dichotomous variable where Black single mothers are coded as 1 and White single mothers as 0, along with measures for year and length of observation. Model 2 incorporates socioeconomic variables, while Model 3 adds demographic characteristics. Model 4 concludes these tables with the inclusion of contextual characteristics. Finally, in Table 4, we test an interaction to determine whether the effect of family income on residential stability differs between Black and White single mothers, while controlling for the full set of variables included in Model 4 of Tables 2 and 3.
Lastly, while logistic regression is frequently used to analyze dichotomous dependent variables such as ours, it presents limitations for comparing coefficients across models. As Mood (2010) highlights, logit coefficients are influenced by unequal variances across models, complicating cross-model comparisons. Our application of three-level random-intercepts linear probability models overcomes this issue, as these models allow for the direct comparison of coefficients across models while accounting for the nested structure of the PSID.

4. Results

Table 1 provides a preliminary overview of Black and White single-mother family differences in socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics by their type of origin neighborhood. Starting with families who begin in non-poor neighborhoods, 94% of White single mothers are likely to remain in non-poor neighborhoods between mobility intervals, compared to 81% of Black single mothers. For families who start in poor neighborhoods, 83% of White single mothers stay in those neighborhoods across sample waves. The likelihood of remaining in poor neighborhoods was higher for Black single mothers, with 88% of these households continuing in those spaces between PSID interviews. Also of importance is the fact that Black single mothers are highly selected into poor neighborhoods compared to their White counterparts, with a ratio of 9.10 to 1. By contrast, the ratio of Black to White single mothers in non-poor neighborhoods is much lower, at 1.16 to 1.
The Black and White single-mother group differences in the likelihood of remaining in either non-poor or poor neighborhoods observed in Table 1 are likely associated with considerable variation in socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics. We witness single-mother group differences clearly as it relates to socioeconomic status. For instance, in constant 2010 dollars, White single mothers who start in a non-poor neighborhood earn on average $35,790 and Black single mothers earn approximately $10,000 less at $25,080. Their incomes are more similar when they begin in poor neighborhoods. In this neighborhood context, White single mothers typically earned $18,660 with Black single mothers following closely at $18,090. Within neighborhood contexts, Black and White single mothers achieve similar levels of education, though in poor neighborhoods, Black single mothers show slightly higher educational attainment than their White single mother counterparts. White single mothers in non-poor neighborhoods are more likely to be employed than Black single mothers. However, in poor neighborhoods, the pattern reverses, with Black single mothers being more likely to be employed than White single mothers. White single mothers are more likely to own homes than Black single mothers in both non-poor and poor neighborhoods. This gap is most pronounced in non-poor neighborhoods. In poor neighborhoods, homeownership is less common overall, but White single mothers emerge with a modest advantage.
There are notable differences in demographic characteristics between Black and White single mothers. The average age of mothers is relatively similar between the two groups across neighborhood types, with Black single mothers being slightly younger than White single mothers regardless of whether they start in non-poor or poor neighborhoods. Black single mothers are also more likely to have younger children than White single mothers across both neighborhood contexts. Black single mothers tend to have more children than White single mothers, irrespective of neighborhood type, with the difference in the number of children being more pronounced in non-poor neighborhoods than in poor neighborhoods. Additionally, household crowding, measured by persons per room, is higher for Black single mothers than for White single mothers in both non-poor and poor neighborhoods, though only slightly higher in poor neighborhoods. Black single mothers are less likely than White single mothers in both types of neighborhoods to reside in their same house for three plus years, with that difference being most stark for those starting in non-poor neighborhoods.
Additionally, Black and White single mothers have differences in contextual characteristics. On average, Black single mothers beginning in non-poor neighborhoods have fewer homeowners in their neighborhoods compared to White single mothers, and that pattern persists for Black single mothers starting in poor neighborhoods but to a lesser extent. Scores for the dissimilarity index, which measures Black-White residential segregation, are largely similar for Black and White single mothers starting in non-poor neighborhoods, yet Black single mothers beginning in poor neighborhoods register a higher exposure to segregation than White single mothers starting in the same neighborhoods. The percentage of Black individuals in metropolitan areas is considerably higher for Black single mothers beginning in either non-poor or poor neighborhoods. Poverty rates in metropolitan areas are relatively similar across single-mother and neighborhood types, with White single mothers starting in poor tracts having the highest rate of metropolitan poverty. Single-mother family differences are relatively minimal as it relates to the log of population size across those starting in non-poor or poor neighborhoods. Black single mothers tend to reside in metropolitan areas that have newer housing stock than White single mothers in both neighborhood types. Lastly, the percentage of vacant housing units exhibits minimal heterogeneity across single-mother families for those beginning in non-poor or poor neighborhoods.
The descriptive statistics from Table 1 indicate distinct differences in neighborhood socioeconomic status across Black and White single-mother families that are plausibly related to variations in socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics. Therefore, to further investigate racial differences between single mothers and the neighborhoods in which they remain, we conduct a series of three-level random-intercepts linear probability models predicting the probability that single mothers will remain in a non-poor neighborhood rather than migrating to a poor neighborhood while controlling for a suite of relevant control variables. With that, Model 1 of Table 2 highlights that compared to White single mothers, Black single mothers have a 19.71-percentage-point decrease (p < 0.001) in the probability of remaining in a non-poor neighborhood rather than move to a poor neighborhood while controlling for both year and length of observation. Model 2 includes the socioeconomic control variables of family income, years of education, employment status, and homeownership. With the inclusion of these controls, Black single mothers witness a decline in the probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods from Model 1 to Model 2 compared to White single mothers, with a statistically significant 15.27-percentage-point decrease (p < 0.001). Supplemental analysis reveals that the reduction in the coefficient is primarily driven by the variable for homeownership.
Model 3 adds the demographic controls of age of single mothers, average age of children, number of children, persons per room, and living in the same house for three plus years. From Model 2, however, there is only a slight decline in the difference in the probability that Black single mothers remain in non-poor neighborhoods (b = −0.1427, p < 0.001) rather than migrate to a poor neighborhood across sample waves as compared to White single mothers net of controls. In Model 4, we control for a large set of contextual characteristics, including the percent of homeowners at the tract level, as well as various metropolitan characteristics such as dissimilarity, percent Black individuals, percent poverty, population size, percent units built within the last 10 years, and percent of vacant housing units. The addition of these control variables does little to adjust the probability that Black single mothers are less apt to remain in a non-poor neighborhood (b = −0.1512, p < 0.001) than move to a poor one relative to White single mothers.
Table 3 displays the probability that single mothers will remain in a poor neighborhood rather than migrate to a non-poor neighborhood between PSID interviews. When controlling for year and length of observation in Model 1, Black single mothers have a 2.87-percentage-point increase in the probability of remaining in a poor neighborhood than move to a non-poor neighborhood compared to White single mothers; however, that effect fails to reach conventional levels of statistical significance (p < 0.10). Model 2 includes a set of socioeconomic characteristics. With the inclusion of these controls, the probability that Black single mothers are more likely to remain in a poor neighborhood than move to a non-poor neighborhood relative to White single mothers increases to 4.52 percentage points and becomes statistically significant (p < 0.01). Supplemental analysis indicates that the covariate for educational attainment is suppressing this focal relationship and its statistical significance. Model 3 adds demographic characteristics to the variables present in Model 2. With these controls included in the model, Black single mothers display a similar difference in their probability of remaining in a poor neighborhood rather than moving to a non-poor neighborhood compared to White single mothers, with a predicted probability of 4.87 percentage points (p < 0.01). After accounting for contextual characteristics in Model 4, the percentage-point gap between Black and White single mothers remains largely consistent with Model 3, showing a statistically significant difference of 5.19 percentage points (p < 0.001).
To investigate Black and White single mothers’ variation in the effect of socioeconomic resources, specifically family income, on the probability of either remaining in non-poor or poor neighborhoods, the place stratification theory proposes two versions, the weak and the strong. We test these versions in Table 4 with an interaction between family income and single-mother families while controlling for socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics. The interaction term in Model 1 indicates that Black single mothers exhibit a statistically significant difference in the association between family income and their probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods across sample waves compared to White single mothers. In particular, the effect of family income is stronger for Black single mothers (b = 0.0016–0.0005 = 0.0011; p < 0.001) than for White single mothers (b = −0.0005; p < 0.05). This finding is consistent with the weak version of the place stratification theory, demonstrating that the effect of family income is stronger for Black single mothers’ probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods relative to White single mothers. The interaction term in Model 2 shows the opposite pattern. The effect of family income on remaining in poor neighborhoods is weaker for Black single mothers (b = 0.0017–0.0025 = −0.0008; p < 0.05) compared to White single mothers (b = −0.0025; p < 0.001). This finding aligns with the strong version of the place stratification theory, indicating that family income has a weaker effect on Black single mothers’ probability of avoiding poor neighborhoods compared to their White single-mother peers.
We also conducted supplemental analyses to investigate interactions between single-mother families and both homeownership and educational attainment. First, as previously discussed, a supplemental analysis of Model 2 of Table 2 revealed that homeownership was the primary driver of the reduction in the coefficient, observed in Model 1, for Black single mothers’ probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods as compared to White single mothers. In response to this finding, we assessed whether there were racial differences in the effect of homeownership in remaining in non-poor neighborhoods across sample waves. After controlling for the socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics listed in Model 4 of Table 2, Black single mothers who do not own their homes have a lower probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods than White single mothers who are not homeowners (b = −0.1928, p < 0.001). Aligning with the weak version of the place stratification theory, the effect of homeownership is stronger for Black single mothers (b = 0.1400 + 0.0366 = 0.1766; p < 0.001) than for White single mothers (b = 0.0366; p < 0.05).
Second, we tested Black and White single mother differences in the probability of remaining in poor neighborhoods between interviews in Model 1 of Table 3, but the effect was not statistically significant. In Model 2 we included controls for socioeconomic characteristics, resulting in larger racial differences that were statistically significant. A prior supplemental analysis of Model 2 of Table 3 indicated that educational attainment was the main covariate suppressing this relationship. Based on this, we assessed whether there were racial differences in the effect of educational attainment on the probability of remaining in poor neighborhoods. The main effects for Black single mothers, educational attainment, and their interaction were not statistically significant.
We provide Figure 1 to assist in clarifying the interaction between Black and White single mothers and family income, as estimated in Models 1 and 2 of Table 4. The figure is divided into two panels, A and B, which depict racial differences in the association between family income and neighborhood outcomes, with all covariates held at their mean values and family income constrained to the 10th to 90th percentiles. Panel A shows the predicted probability that single mothers will remain in non-poor neighborhoods rather than migrate to poor neighborhoods between interviews. Across the income distribution, White single mothers exhibit a high probability of staying in non-poor neighborhoods. Notably, as family income increases, their probability of staying decreases slightly. Black single mothers, in contrast, evince a positive association between family income and the probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods, indicating that economic resources have a stronger effect on their residential stability in these spaces than White single mothers. However, following the weak version of the place stratification theory, even among the highest-income Black single mothers, the probability of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods trails behind that of White single mothers. Panel B displays the predicted probability of remaining in poor neighborhoods rather than migrating to non-poor neighborhoods. White single mothers who start in poor neighborhoods are less likely to remain in these spaces as their family income increases. Black single mothers are congruent with the strong version of the place stratification theory, where they exhibit a negative association between family income and the probability of remaining in poor neighborhoods, though less pronounced than that of White single mothers.

5. Discussion

In this study, we have used 45 years of data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics combined with contextual data from the U.S. Census to examine the residential stability and mobility processes of Black single mothers relative to White single mothers. Despite past research providing insight on these households (Desmond 2016; McDonald and Richards 2008; South and Crowder 1998; Stack 1974; Wilson 1987), much remains to be understood about how they function within the housing market. In particular, past quantitative scholarship has neglected whether there are racial group differences in remaining in both non-poor and poor neighborhoods. There has also been little quantitative research studying whether there are racial group differences in how economic resources are related to single mothers remaining in non-poor neighborhoods or moving out of poor ones. We have sought to shed light on these dynamics, recognizing that single mothers—who must navigate the compounded challenges of raising children alone and structural disadvantages tied to gender—are likely to be especially reliant on neighborhood-based resources for themselves and their children.
Our results indicate that Black single mothers are less likely to remain in non-poor neighborhoods than White single mothers, and the disparity between these two groups is highly pronounced even when controlling for socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics. This finding demonstrates the precarious hold that Black single mothers have on higher-opportunity spaces. Research from Chetty et al. (2016) highlights the importance of this finding. They observe that when families are given vouchers to move from high-poverty housing projects to lower-poverty neighborhoods that children’s life course outcomes improve. When children make this transition before the age of 13, they are more likely to attend college and see an increase in earnings, while also having a lower chance of becoming a single parent. However, they find that there is a decline in the gains for children when a move happens at later ages, suggesting that the duration of exposure to higher-opportunity neighborhoods matters. Our findings emphasize how uncommon it is for one of the most socioeconomically disadvantaged families, Black single mothers, to remain in resource-rich neighborhoods and, hence, receive the benefits of those spaces. In contrast, White single mothers appear distinctly advantaged in this regard, in that they are more likely to stay in non-poor, higher-opportunity neighborhoods. Such a finding suggests that White single mothers might be drawing on alternative resources to remain in these neighborhoods, possibly receiving cash transfers from kin.
Black single mothers are also more likely to remain in poor neighborhoods than migrate to non-poor neighborhoods relative to White single mothers and that difference remains after accounting for socioeconomic, demographic, and contextual characteristics. While structural forms of discrimination could strongly influence this pattern (Massey and Lundy 2001; Turner et al. 2013), qualitative research on Black single mothers offers an additional determinant. In their study of the residential patterns of Black single mothers, McDonald and Richards (2008) found a trend among the women in their sample: that many chose to remain in poor neighborhoods. That choice may be motivated by connections to kith, kin, and, as Radford-Hill (2000) states, their responsibility to be “culture bearers and community builders.” This might involve remaining in a poor neighborhood to care for a poor and aging parent or simply wanting to maintain a sense of belonging with kith they have come to love.
Taken collectively, these findings highlight that in comparison to White single mothers, when Black single mothers begin in poor neighborhoods, they have a high probability of remaining in them; and, when they start in non-poor neighborhoods, they have a high probability of falling out of them. Thus, the chance that Black single mothers achieve upward neighborhood mobility is limited, and their continued presence in socioeconomically impoverished contexts appears durable. What is more, even Black single mothers at the high end of their income distribution seem unable to convert their economic resources into long-term residence in more advantaged neighborhoods. There is an exception, however, it appears that Black single mothers who own their homes have a markedly greater chance of remaining in non-poor neighborhoods. Yet even within this group, they still lag behind their White homeowning counterparts in maintaining residence in these spaces. While the place stratification theory would posit these racial differences are predominantly driven by discrimination, a lack of available data makes it impossible to disentangle the relative contributions of discrimination in the housing market vis-à-vis individual preferences on the residential stability and mobility patterns of Black single mothers relative to White single mothers.
What we do know, however, is that the economic resources of many Black single mothers are largely minimal and those at the higher end of the income distribution for this group tend to not translate their resources into more economically advantaged neighborhoods. The effects of this have been pernicious. Sharkey’s (2008) study illuminates this, showing that 70% of Black children raised in the poorest quarter of neighborhoods continued to live in similarly disadvantaged neighborhoods as adults, compared to 40% of White children. This stark pattern in neighborhood trajectories highlights the intergenerational transmission of contextual disadvantage, where children inherit not only economic hardship but also the detrimental conditions associated with these environments that include limited access to quality healthcare, exposure to environmental hazards, and high rates of violent crime (Brown et al. 2023; Kravitz-Wirtz et al. 2018; Krivo et al. 2009).
Our results point to new dimensions for future research on racial differences in residential stability and mobility for single mothers. Case in point, we observe that controlling for socioeconomic characteristics does little to erode Black-White single-mother family differences in residential stability and mobility, indicating that other forces are likely attributing to the continued gap between these groups. Future research would benefit by gathering data on perceived housing market discrimination, preferences for certain types of neighborhoods, along with information on the density and location of single mothers’ social networks. Such data could provide substantial quantitative evidence on the relative roles these forces have on racial differences in the residential stability and mobility patterns of single mothers. Future research could also gain valuable insights from examining how family structure interacts with race to shape residential stability and mobility patterns. For instance, comparing single-parent and two-parent families within and across racial groups could reveal the extent to which family structure is associated with racial disparities in residential stability and mobility outcomes. A study of this nature could highlight differences that are even more pronounced than those presented here, as single mothers—a particularly vulnerable group—typically have fewer resources than two-parent families.
Based on the results we have presented, policy efforts to improve the residential outcomes of Black single mothers should consider a variety of interventions. Revitalization efforts in poor neighborhoods, as suggested by McDonald and Richards (2008), can help improve the quality of life for residents while allowing them to remain in their communities. Yet, revitalization efforts should pay special attention to ensure that low-income residents are not displaced by rising rents and overall cost of living. Efforts to improve these neighborhoods should include childcare, job training, and counseling, so that families cannot only live safer lives but also increase their opportunities for advancement throughout the life course. In addition, there can be a greater investment in mobility programs that give Black single mothers opportunities to move to improved neighborhood contexts (Chetty et al. 2016). Specifically, financial assistance in the form of rental subsidies targeted at low-income single mothers could help reduce barriers to accessing more advantageous environments. Moreover, given our findings that homeownership is strongly associated with Black single mothers’ ability to remain in non-poor neighborhoods, policies should also prioritize expanding access to homeownership. This could include targeted down payment assistance programs and more accessible credit opportunities that equip Black single mothers with the resources to purchase stable housing—allowing them and their children to build a secure foundation for upward mobility and a greater chance at breaking the cycle of intergenerational disadvantage.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, R.G.; Methodology, R.G.; Formal analysis, R.G.; Data curation, R.G.; Writing—original draft, R.G.; Writing—review and editing, R.G., P.P. and A.W. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research received no external funding.

Institutional Review Board Statement

Not applicable.

Informed Consent Statement

Not applicable.

Data Availability Statement

Data that generated the results can be found at https://psidonline.isr.umich.edu and (accessed on 13 June 2024) at https://geolytics.com (accessed on 13 June 2024).

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the reviewers for their earlier comments on this article.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

References

  1. Ackert, Elizabeth, Amy Spring, Kyle Crowder, and Scott J. South. 2019. Kin Location and Racial Disparities in Exiting and Entering Poor Neighborhoods. Social Science Research 84: 102346. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  2. Alba, Richard D., and John R. Logan. 1991. Variations on Two Themes: Racial and Ethnic Patterns in the Attainment of Suburban Residence. Demography 28: 431–53. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  3. Alba, Richard D., and John R. Logan. 1993. Locational Returns to Human Capital: Minority Access to Suburban Community Resources. Demography 28: 243–68. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  4. Anderson, Elijah. 2015. The White Space. Sociology of Race and Ethnicity 1: 10–21. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  5. Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo. 2019. Feeling Race: Theorizing the Racial Economy of Emotions. American Sociological Review 84: 1–25. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  6. Broussard, C. Anne. 2010. Research Regarding Low-Income Single Mothers’ Mental and Physical Health: A Decade in Review. Journal of Poverty 14: 443–51. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  7. Brown, Lauren, Urbano L. França, and Michael L. McManus. 2023. Neighborhood Poverty and Distance to Pediatric Hospital Care. Academic Pediatrics 23: 1276–81. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  8. Charles, Camille Zubrinksy. 2006. Won’t You be My Neighbor: Race, Class, and Residence in Los Angeles. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. [Google Scholar]
  9. Charles, Camille Zubrinsky. 2003. The Dynamics of Racial Residential Segregation. Annual Review of Sociology 29: 167–207. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  10. Chetty, Raj, Nathaniel Hendren, and Lawrence F. Katz. 2016. The Effects of Exposure to Better Neighborhoods on Children: New Evidence from the Moving to Opportunity Experiment. American Economic Review 106: 855–902. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  11. Christensen, Peter, and Christopher Timmins. 2022. Sorting or Steering: The Effects of Housing Discrimination on Neighborhood Choice. Journal of Political Economy 130: 2110–63. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  12. Coulton, Claudia, Brett Theodos, and Margery A Turner. 2012. Residential Mobility and Neighborhood Change: Real Neighborhoods Under the Microscope. Cityscape: A Journal of Policy Development and Research 14: 55–89. [Google Scholar]
  13. Crowder, Kyle, and Liam Downey. 2010. Interneighborhood Migration, Race, and Environmental Hazards: Modeling Microlevel Processes of Environmental Inequality. American Journal of Sociology 115: 1110–49. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  14. Damaske, Sarah, Jenifer L. Bratter, and Adrianne Frech. 2017. Single Mother Families and Employment, Race, and Poverty in Changing Economic Times. Social Science Research 62: 120–33. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  15. Desmond, Matthew. 2012. Eviction and the Reproduction of Urban Poverty. American Journal of Sociology 118: 88–133. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  16. Desmond, Matthew. 2016. Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City. New York: Crown Publishers. [Google Scholar]
  17. Do, D. Phuong, Lu Wang, and Michael R. Elliott. 2013. Investigating the Relationship between Neighborhood Poverty and Mortality Risk: A Marginal Structural Modeling Approach. Social Science and Medicine 91: 58–66. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  18. Dwyer, Rachel. E. 2007. Expanding Homes and Increasing Inequalities: U.S. Housing Development and the Residential Segregation of the Affluent. Social Problems 54: 23–46. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  19. Emirbayer, Mustafa, and Matthew Desmond. 2015. The Racial Order. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [Google Scholar]
  20. Faber, Jacob William, and Jocelyn Pak Drummond. 2024. Still Victimized in a Thousand Ways: Segregation as a Tool for Exploitation in the Twenty-First Century. Annual Review of Sociology 50: 501–20. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  21. Firebaugh, Glenn, and Chad R. Farrell. 2016. Still Large, but Narrowing: The Sizable Decline in Racial Neighborhood Inequality in Metropolitan America, 1980–2010. Demography 53: 139–64. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  22. Frazier, E. Franklin. 1968. On Race Relations. Edited by G. Franklin Edwards. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [Google Scholar]
  23. Galster, George, and Patrick Sharkey. 2017. Spatial Foundations of Inequality: A Conceptual Model and Empirical Overview. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 3: 1–32. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  24. GeoLytics. 2013. Neighborhood Change Database [Database]. East Brunswick: GeoLytics, Inc. [Google Scholar]
  25. Gordon, Cynthia, Marnie Purciel-Hill, Nirupa R. Ghai, Leslie Kaufman, Regina Graham, and Gretchen Van Wye. 2011. Measuring Food Deserts in New York City’s Low-Income Neighborhoods. Health and Place 17: 696–700. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  26. Harding, David J. 2010. Living the Drama: Community, Conflict, and Culture Among Inner-City Boys. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [Google Scholar]
  27. Hepburn, Peter, Renee Louis, and Matthew Desmond. 2020. Racial and Gender Disparities among Evicted Americans. Sociological Science 7: 649–62. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  28. Huang, Ying, Scott J. South, Amy Spring, and Kyle Crowder. 2021. Life-Course Exposure to Neighborhood Poverty and Migration Between Poor and Non-Poor Neighborhoods. Population Research and Policy Review 40: 401–29. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  29. Hunter, Marcus Anthony, and Zandria F. Robinson. 2016. The Sociology of Urban Black America. Annual Review of Sociology 42: 385–405. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  30. Jargowsky, Paul A. 1996. Take the Money and Run: Economic Segregation in U.S. Metropolitan Areas. American Sociological Review 61: 984–98. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  31. Jargowsky, Paul A. 1997. Poverty and Place: Ghettos, Barrios, and the American City. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. [Google Scholar]
  32. Kim, Yeonwoo, Sharon Lee, Hyejin Jung, Jose Jaime, and Catherine Cubbin. 2019. Is Neighborhood Poverty Harmful to Every Child? Neighborhood Poverty, Family Poverty, and Behavioral Problems among Young Children. Journal of Community Psychology 47: 594–610. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  33. Kravitz-Wirtz, Nicole, Samantha Teixeira, Anjum Hajat, Bongki Woo, Kyle Crowder, and David Takeuchi. 2018. Early-Life Air Pollution Exposure, Neighborhood Poverty, and Childhood Asthma in the United States, 1990–2014. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 15: 1114. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  34. Krivo, Lauren J, Ruth D Peterson, and Danielle C Kuhl. 2009. Segregation, Racial Structure, and Neighborhood Violent Crime. American Journal of Sociology 114: 1765–802. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  35. Ladner, Joyce A. 1971. Tomorrow’s Tomorrow: The Black Woman. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, vol. 839. [Google Scholar]
  36. Lee, Kwan Ok, Richard Smith, and George Galster. 2017. Neighborhood Trajectories of Low-Income U.S. Households: An Application of Sequence Analysis. Journal of Urban Affairs 39: 335–57. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  37. Logan, John R., and Harvey L. Molotch. 1987. Urban Fortunes: The Political Economy of Place. Berkeley: University of California Press. [Google Scholar]
  38. Massey, Douglas S., and Brendan P. Mullan. 1984. Processes of Hispanic and Black Spatial Assimilation. American Journal of Sociology 89: 836–73. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  39. Massey, Douglas S., and Garvey Lundy. 2001. Use of Black English and Racial Discrimination in Urban Housing Markets: New Methods and Findings. Urban Affairs Review 36: 452–69. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  40. Massey, Douglas S., and Nancy A. Denton. 1993. American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of the Underclass. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Google Scholar]
  41. McDonald, Katrina Bell, and Bedelia Nicola Richards. 2008. Downward Residential Mobility in Structural-Cultural Context: The Case of Disadvantaged Black Mothers. Black Women, Gender + Families 2: 25–53. [Google Scholar]
  42. Mood, Carina. 2010. Logistic Regression: Why We Cannot Do What We Think We Can Do, and What We Can Do About It. European Sociological Review 26: 67–82. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  43. Morrissey, Taryn W., and Katie M. Vinopal. 2018. Neighborhood Poverty and Children’s Academic Skills and Behavior in Early Elementary School. Journal of Marriage and Family 80: 182–97. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  44. Moynihan, Daniel P. 1965. The Negro Family: The Case for National Action; Washington, DC: Office of Policy Planning and Research, United States Department of Labor.
  45. Pais, Jeremy F., Scott J. South, and Kyle Crowder. 2009. White Flight Revisited: A Multiethnic Perspective on Neighborhood Out-Migration. Population Research and Policy Review 28: 321–46. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  46. Pais, Jeremy, Scott J South, and Kyle Crowder. 2012. Metropolitan Heterogeneity and Minority Neighborhood Attainment: Spatial Assimilation or Place Stratification? Social Problems 59: 258–81. [Google Scholar]
  47. Panel Study of Income Dynamics, Restricted Use Data. 2024. Ann Arbor: Produced and Distributed by the Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan.
  48. Pettit, Becky, and Stephanie Ewert. 2009. Employment Gains and Wage Declines: The Erosion of Black Women’s Relative Wages Since 1980. Demography 46: 469–92. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  49. Radford-Hill, Sheila. 2000. Further to Fly: Black Women and the Politics of Empowerment. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. [Google Scholar]
  50. Rérat, Patrick. 2020. Residential Mobility. In Handbook of Urban Mobilities, 1st ed. Edited by Ole B. Jensen, Claus Lassen, Vincent Kaufmann, Malene Freudendal-Pedersen and Ida Sofie Gøtzsche Lange. Milton Park: Routledge. [Google Scholar]
  51. Roscigno, Vincent J, Diana L Karafin, and Griff Tester. 2009. The Complexities and Processes of Racial Housing Discrimination. Social Problems 56: 49–69. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  52. Rossi, Peter. 1955. Why Families Move. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications. [Google Scholar]
  53. Sampson, Robert J. 2012. Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [Google Scholar]
  54. Sampson, Robert J., Jeffrey D. Morenoff, and Thomas Gannon-Rowley. 2002. Assessing ‘Neighborhood Effects’: Social Processes and New Directions in Research. Annual Review of Sociology 28: 443–78. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  55. Sharkey, Patrick. 2008. The Intergenerational Transmission of Context. American Journal of Sociology 113: 931–69. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  56. Sharkey, Patrick, and Felix Elwert. 2011. The Legacy of Disadvantage: Multigenerational Neighborhood Effects on Cognitive Ability. American Journal of Sociology 116: 1934–81. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  57. Sharkey, Patrick, and Jacob W. Faber. 2014. Where, When, Why, and For Whom Do Residential Contexts Matter? Moving Away from the Dichotomous Understanding of Neighborhood Effects. Annual Review of Sociology 40: 559–79. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  58. Sharkey, Patrick, and Robert J. Sampson. 2010. Destination Effects: Residential Mobility and Trajectories of Adolescent Violence in a Stratified Metropolis. Criminology 48: 639–81. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  59. South, Scott J., and Kyle D. Crowder. 1997. Escaping Distressed Neighborhoods: Individual, Community, and Metropolitan Influences. American Journal of Sociology 102: 1040–84. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  60. South, Scott J., and Kyle D. Crowder. 1998. Avenues and Barriers to Residential Mobility among Single Mothers. Source: Journal of Marriage and Family 60: 866–77. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  61. South, Scott J., Kyle Crowder, and Erick Chavez. 2005. Exiting and Entering High Poverty Neighborhoods: Latinos, Blacks and Anglos Compared. Social Forces 84: 873–900. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  62. South, Scott J., Ying Huang, Amy Spring, and Kyle Crowder. 2016. Neighborhood Attainment over the Adult Life Course. American Sociological Review 81: 1276–304. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  63. Spring, Amy, Elizabeth Ackert, Kyle Crowder, and Scott J South. 2017. Influence of Proximity to Kin on Residential Mobility and Destination Choice: Examining Local Movers in Metropolitan Areas. Demography 54: 1277–304. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  64. Stack, Carol B. 1974. All Our Kin: Strategies for Survival in a Black Community, 1st ed. Manhattan: Harper & Row. [Google Scholar]
  65. Tolnay, Stewart E. 2001. The Great Migration Gets Underway: A Comparison of Black Southern Migrants and Nonmigrants in the North, 1920. Social Science Quarterly 82: 235–52. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  66. Turner, Margery Austin, Rob Santos, Diane K Levy, Doug Wissoker, Claudia Aranda, and Rob Pitingolo. 2013. Housing Discrimination Against Racial and Ethnic Minorities 2012; Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
  67. US Census Bureau. 2023. Table CH-3. Living Arrangements of Black Children Under 18 Years Old: 1960 to Present. Available online: https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/families/children.html (accessed on 13 June 2024).
  68. VonLockette, Nick Dickerson. 2010. The Impact of Metropolitan Residential Segregation on the Employment Chances of Blacks and Whites in the United States. City & Community 9: 256–73. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  69. Wang, Kyungsoon, and Dan Immergluck. 2019. Housing Vacancy and Urban Growth: Explaining Changes in Long-Term Vacancy after the US Foreclosure Crisis. Journal of Housing and the Built Environment 34: 511. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  70. White, Michael J. 1987. American Neighborhoods and Residential Differentiation. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. [Google Scholar]
  71. Wilson, William Julius. 1987. The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [Google Scholar]
  72. Wodtke, Geoffrey T., David J. Harding, and Felix Elwert. 2011. Neighborhood Effects in Temporal Perspective: The Impact of Long-Term Exposure to Concentrated Disadvantage on High School Graduation. American Sociological Review 76: 713–36. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  73. Wolch, Jennifer, John Wilson, and Jed Fehrenbach. 2005. Parks and Park Funding in Los Angeles: An Equity-Mapping Analysis. Urban Geography 26: 4–35. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
Socsci 14 00149 g001
Figure 1. Probability of Black and White Single Mothers Remaining in Non-Poor or Poor Neighborhoods.
Figure 1. Probability of Black and White Single Mothers Remaining in Non-Poor or Poor Neighborhoods.
Socsci 14 00149 g001
Table 1. Descriptive Statistics.
Table 1. Descriptive Statistics.
In a Non-Poor Tract at Time t  In a Poor Tract at Time t
Black Single MothersWhite Single Mothers Black Single MothersWhite Single Mothers
MeanSDMeanSD MeanSDMeanSD
Dependent Variables
 Percent remaining in a Non-Poor, Time t to t + 1 81.4438.8794.2523.26
   N31392693
 Percent remaining in a Poor Tract, Time t to t + 1 88.9131.3983.0537.53
   N 6877755
Socioeconomic Characteristics
 Family Income (in $1000s)25.0818.4335.7931.95 18.0913.9118.6615.16
 Education (in Years)12.082.4312.432.95 11.362.1010.493.05
 Employed (1 = Yes)0.680.470.730.44 0.520.500.480.50
 Homeowner (1 = Yes)0.270.440.450.50 0.160.370.200.40
Demographic Characteristics
 Age34.958.7937.238.80 33.968.7935.709.43
 Average Age of Children9.684.5910.114.62 9.384.629.624.73
 Number of Children2.151.341.821.05 2.341.392.111.30
 Persons Per Room0.790.480.670.45 0.870.550.860.49
 Same House 3+ Years (1 = Yes)0.380.490.490.50 0.420.490.480.50
Contextual Characteristics
 Percent Homeowners, Tract57.3518.9762.9918.52 35.4518.8936.4719.00
 Dissimilarity, Metro0.650.120.650.14 0.700.120.650.13
 Percent Black Individuals, Metro21.559.7511.879.12 21.749.5711.237.36
 Percent Poverty, Metro11.843.3211.492.86 12.363.3313.424.74
 Population Size (ln), Metro14.401.1014.231.39 14.571.0814.481.45
 Percent Units Built 0–10 Yrs. Ago, Metro22.688.6620.339.16 22.148.9919.4510.06
 Percent Housing Units Vacant, Metro7.532.577.243.96 7.172.407.743.82
 
Year at End of Observation1990.6912.601988.9611.68 1987.4411.651990.4511.55
Length of Observation Period 1.320.471.230.42 1.210.411.230.42
N of Single Parent Observations38542857 7734909
Table 2. Multilevel Linear Probability Models for Single Parents Remaining in Non-Poor Neighborhoods.
Table 2. Multilevel Linear Probability Models for Single Parents Remaining in Non-Poor Neighborhoods.
Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4
B SE B SE B SE B SE
Single Parents
 Black Single Mothers−0.1971***(0.0151) −0.1527***(0.0144) −0.1427***(0.0140) −0.1512***(0.0149)
Socioeconomic Characteristics
 Family Income (in $1000s) 0.0002 (0.0002) −0.0000 (0.0002) −0.0001 (0.0002)
 Education (in Years) 0.0120***(0.0025) 0.0126***(0.0024) 0.0123***(0.0024)
 Employed (1 = Yes) 0.0436***(0.0100) 0.0398***(0.0100) 0.0400***(0.0100)
 Homeowner (1 = Yes) 0.1424***(0.0118) 0.1120***(0.0122) 0.1126***(0.0125)
Demographic Characteristics
 Age 0.0053***(0.0010) 0.0054***(0.0010)
 Average Age of Children 0.0045 (0.0043) 0.0001 (0.0016)
 Number of Children 0.0003 (0.0016) 0.0048 (0.0043)
 Persons Per Room −0.0365***(0.0097) −0.0349***(0.0097)
 Same House 3+ Years (1 = Yes) −0.0016 (0.0089) −0.0020 (0.0089)
Contextual Characteristics
 Percent Homeowners, Tract −0.0001 (0.0003)
 Dissimilarity, Metro −0.0185*(0.0079)
 Percent Black Individuals, Metro 0.0025**(0.0008)
 Percent Poverty, Metro −0.0097***(0.0025)
 Population Size (ln), Metro 0.0045 (0.0071)
 Percent Units Built 0–10 Yrs. Ago, Metro −0.0019 (0.0011)
 Percent Housing Units Vacant, Metro 0.0020 (0.0024)
 
Year−0.0007 (0.0007) −0.0018**(0.0007) −0.0029***(0.0007) −0.0044***(0.0011)
Length of observation−0.0203 (0.0165) −0.0384*(0.0163) −0.0400 (0.0163) −0.0402*(0.0164)
Intercept2.3784 (1.3469) 4.3249**(1.3332) 6.2831***(1.3537) 9.4509***(2.0933)
 
Variance Components
 Between MSAs −2.7792***(0.1851) −2.8554***(0.1789) −2.9566***(0.1938) −3.3725***(0.3359)
 Between Individuals−1.3765***(0.0292) −1.4835***(0.0325) −1.5301***(0.0346) −1.5297***(0.0345)
 Residual−1.3559***(0.0113) −1.3505***(0.0115) −1.3471***(0.0116) −1.3467***(0.0116)
Note: N of observations = 6711; * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.
Table 3. Multilevel Linear Probability Models for Single Parents Remaining in Poor Neighborhoods.
Table 3. Multilevel Linear Probability Models for Single Parents Remaining in Poor Neighborhoods.
Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4
B SE B SE B SE B SE
Single Parents
 Black Single Mothers0.0287 (0.0174) 0.0452**(0.0144) 0.0487**(0.0164) 0.0519**(0.0171)
Socioeconomic Characteristics
 Family Income (in $1000s) −0.0004 (0.0003) −0.0010**(0.0003) −0.0009**(0.0003)
 Education (in Years) −0.0099***(0.0022) −0.0062**(0.0022) −0.0051*(0.0022)
 Employed (1 = Yes) −0.0091 (0.0084) −0.0115 (0.0084) −0.0123 (0.0084)
 Homeowner (1 = Yes) 0.0834***(0.0121) 0.0633***(0.0122) 0.0643***(0.0123)
Demographic Characteristics
 Age 0.0035***(0.0008) 0.0035***(0.0008)
 Average Age of Children −0.0002 (0.0014) −0.0002 (0.0014)
 Number of Children 0.0004 (0.0032) −0.0001 (0.0032)
 Persons Per Room −0.0024 (0.0071) −0.0032 (0.0071)
 Same House 3+ Years (1 = Yes) 0.0222**(0.0078) 0.0219**(0.0078)
Contextual Characteristics
 Percent Homeowners, Tract 0.0002 (0.0003)
 Dissimilarity, Metro 0.0203*(0.0090)
 Percent Black Individuals, Metro 0.0001 (0.0009)
 Percent Poverty, Metro 0.0116***(0.0021)
 Population Size (ln), Metro 0.0195*(0.0089)
 Percent Units Built 0–10 Yrs. Ago, Metro −0.0006 (0.0012)
 Percent Housing Units Vacant, Metro −0.0026 (0.0029)
 
Year−0.0013*(0.0006) −0.0007 (0.0006) −0.0012*(0.0006) −0.0011 (0.0011)
Length of observation−0.0722***(0.0147) −0.0751***(0.0148) −0.0759***(0.0147) −0.0750***(0.0149)
Intercept3.3637**(1.1084) 2.3316*(1.1300) 3.2328**(1.1336) 2.3901 (2.0933)
Variance Components
 Between MSAs −2.3933***(0.1554) −2.4142***(0.1526) −2.5332***(0.1620) −2.7658***(0.2234)
 Between Individuals−1.7818***(0.0460) −1.8398***(0.0496) −1.9482***(0.0604) −1.9413***(0.0600)
 Residual−1.2684***(0.0097) −1.2655***(0.0098) −1.2558***(0.0102) −1.2577***(0.0101)
Note: N of observations = 8643; * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.
Table 4. Multilevel Linear Probability Models of Black and White Single Mothers Remaining in Non-Poor or Poor Neighborhoods by Family Income.
Table 4. Multilevel Linear Probability Models of Black and White Single Mothers Remaining in Non-Poor or Poor Neighborhoods by Family Income.
Model 1 Model 2
Remain in Non-Poor vs. Move to Poor Remain in Poor vs. Move to Non-Poor
Black Single Mothers−0.1944***(0.0184) 0.0190 (0.0231)
Family Income (in $1000s)−0.0005*(0.0002) −0.0025**(0.0008)
Black Single Mothers X Family Income (in $1000s)0.0016***(0.0004) 0.0017*(0.0008)
 
Socioeconomic, Demographic, and Contextual ControlsY Y
 
Year−0.0043***(0.0010) −0.0011 (0.0011)
Length of observation−0.0425**(0.0164) −0.0748***(0.0149)
Intercept9.3875***(2.0778) 2.5644 (2.1590)
 
Variance Components
 Between MSAs −3.4133***(0.3502) −2.7734***(0.2245)
 Between Individuals−1.5435***(0.0352) −1.9403***(0.0600)
 Residual−1.3448***(0.0117) −1.2580***(0.0102)
N6711 8643
Note: * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.
Disclaimer/Publisher’s Note: The statements, opinions and data contained in all publications are solely those of the individual author(s) and contributor(s) and not of MDPI and/or the editor(s). MDPI and/or the editor(s) disclaim responsibility for any injury to people or property resulting from any ideas, methods, instructions or products referred to in the content.

Share and Cite

MDPI and ACS Style

Gabriel, R.; Polhill, P.; Waite, A. Staying or Moving: Racial Differences in Single Mothers’ Residential Stability. Soc. Sci. 2025, 14, 149. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14030149

AMA Style

Gabriel R, Polhill P, Waite A. Staying or Moving: Racial Differences in Single Mothers’ Residential Stability. Social Sciences. 2025; 14(3):149. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14030149

Chicago/Turabian Style

Gabriel, Ryan, Peter Polhill, and Adrienne Waite. 2025. "Staying or Moving: Racial Differences in Single Mothers’ Residential Stability" Social Sciences 14, no. 3: 149. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14030149

APA Style

Gabriel, R., Polhill, P., & Waite, A. (2025). Staying or Moving: Racial Differences in Single Mothers’ Residential Stability. Social Sciences, 14(3), 149. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14030149

Note that from the first issue of 2016, this journal uses article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.

Article Metrics

Back to TopTop