RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Fiscal Fragility in Black Middle-Class Suburbia and Consequences for K–12 Schools and Other Public Services
JF RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences
FD Russell Sage Foundation
SP 204
OP 225
DO 10.7758/RSF.2023.9.2.09
VO 9
IS 2
A1 Angela Simms
YR 2023
UL http://www.rsfjournal.org/content/9/2/204.abstract
AB In the United States, most local jurisdictions are challenged as they seek to maintain fiscal strength. But majority-Black jurisdictions are uniquely burdened due to legacy and contemporary racist and racialized policies and racial capitalism. Leaders in majority-Black locales make harsher budget trade-offs than those in majority-White jurisdictions as they seek to invest in public schools and other public services. I use ethnographic and publicly available data to examine how Prince George’s County, Maryland, a majority-Black and middle-class suburban jurisdiction in the Washington, D.C., region, navigates its financial constraints relative to neighboring counties with smaller Black populations. I conclude that Black jurisdictions’ fiscal limitations stem from White jurisdictions’ not bearing their proportionate share of responsibility for moderate-income and economically distressed households and fallout from uneven regional development, resulting in Black jurisdictions subsidizing White locales.