Mover Destination Selectivity and the Changing Suburbanization of Metropolitan Whites and Blacks

Urban analysts have suggested that white and black intrametropolitan redistribution patterns may be departing from those of the immediate postwar period. Redistribution patterns within large older SMSAs are examined, using 1955-1960, 1965-1970, and 1975-1980 migration data, to assess changes in white and black city-suburb destination propensity rates and to estimate mover selectivity contributions to suburbanization levels. While white suburbanward redistribution has slowed since 1970, this cannot be attributed to a greater city attraction among well-off and childless young adults. The recent suburbanward redistribution of blacks, however, constitutes a genuine departure from the past in both magnitude and selectivity and resembles the white suburbanward redistribution of the 1950s.