The spatial mismatch hypothesis and black youth joblessness: Evidence from the San Francisco Bay Area

This paper presents an employment-based measure of intra-metropolitan accessibility to employment opportunities that provides strong evidence supporting the spatial mismatch hypothesis. The measure is based on intra-metropolitan variation in net employment growth rather than on spatial variation in employment levels. The principal spatial disadvantage suffered by black male youths is their residence in areas of weak or negative employment growth. In pooled employment regressions, differential accessibility explains 30 to 50% of the neighborhood employment rate differential between white and black male Ray-Area youths. In separate employment regressions by race, approximately one-fifth of the differential is attributable to differential access. (C) 1998 Academic Press.