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The Reversal of Mount Laurel’s Regional Contribution Agreements and the Impact on White-Black Academic Achievement Gaps Across New Jersey: 2008–2014

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Abstract

Regional Contribution Agreements (RCAs) under New Jersey’s Fair Housing Act allowed municipalities to transfer up to half of their affordable housing obligations to a neighboring town. This paper uses the reversal of RCAs in 2008 as a natural experiment to investigate the impact that increasing affordable housing has on the white-black achievement gap in New Jersey. Using data from the US American Community Survey, the Stanford Education Data Archives and New Jersey’s Department of Community Affairs, structural equation models were specified and fitted to these data. The results suggest that there are differences in changes in the number of affordable housing units by former RCA sending status, and this study sheds some light on the relationship between affordable housing and white-black academic achievement gaps for former RCA-receiving districts. This study adds to the literature by showing that there is a positive relationship between affordable housing unit changes and changes in the white-black academic achievement gaps through changes in school district demographics in districts that were affordable housing–rich.

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  1. Montclair State University, 1 Normal Avenue, Montclair, NJ, 07043, USA

    Elizabeth Iris Rivera Rodas

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Rivera Rodas, E.I. The Reversal of Mount Laurel’s Regional Contribution Agreements and the Impact on White-Black Academic Achievement Gaps Across New Jersey: 2008–2014. J Econ Race Policy 3, 205–220 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41996-020-00059-w

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