| Byron Lutz
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The effects of the end of court-ordered desegregation
FINAL REPORT:
Nearly forty years after Brown v. the Board of Education, three Supreme Court decisions dramatically altered the legal environment for court-ordered desegregation in the early 1990s. Lower courts have released numerous school districts from their desegregation plans as a result. Over the same period racial segregation increased in public schools -- a phenomenon which has been termed resegregation. This paper uses a unique dataset to estimate the causal link between the end of court-ordered desegregation and racial segregation in public schools. The paper also presents evidence on possible behavioral responses to the dismissal of court-ordered desegregation plans such as changes in enrollment by race in public and private schools, dropout rates by race, and school district expenditures. Finally, termination of a court-ordered desegregation plan potentially alters the valuation of the bundle of non-market goods provided by a school district. I therefore examine the impact of desegregation plan dismissal on residential housing prices. The results suggest that dismissal of a court-ordered desegregation plan results in a gradual, moderate increase in racial segregation and an increase in black dropout rates and black private school attendance. There is no evidence of any effect on white attendance patterns, school expenditures or property values
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