Local Change in a Global World: An Analysis of Immigration's Relationship with Gentrifiation

Abstract

The world is urbanizing. Across the planet, cities are growing, developing, and gentrifying, revitalizing their central areas. At the same time, immigration is contributing to the growth of metropolitan areas. Immigration has become one of the most partisan topics in America, demonstrating a lack of understanding about immigrants’ true impact. This thesis analyses the relationship between these two important topics: gentrification and immigration. It seeks to understand how gentrification affects immigrants in three American cities: Houston, TX, Minneapolis, MN, and Portland, OR. This thesis hypothesizes that immigrants live in less gentrified areas, missing out on gentrification’s benefits while bearing a disproportionate amount of gentrification’s costs. It statistically analyzes the relationship between the immigrant percentage of a census tract and the census tract’s gentrification status. Finally, it scrutinizes characteristics of the immigrant population, such as region of origin and naturalization status, to evaluate whether certain sub-sections of the immigrant population drive these effects. Ultimately, this paper finds that the immigrant percentage of a census tract has a negative association with a census tract’s gentrification status. It also finds nonnaturalized immigrants drive this effect, and that in different cities, immigrants from different regions of origin drive it, too. Lastly, this paper finds that international immigrants are more likely to live in areas with lower median home values, less college education, and greater poverty rates as compared to domestic migrants. To combat these inequalities, this thesis proposes expanding rent control regulations and increasing access to higher education for adult immigrants through the Department of Education’s Literacy Information and Communication Systems Program.