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What D.C.’s Go-Go Showdown Reveals About Gentrification | CityLab

April 17, 2019
  • D.C. Policy Center

On April 17, 2019, D.C. Policy Center Senior Fellow David Rusk’s article on D.C.’s changing demographics was cited by CityLab:

In Shaw, though, gentrification isn’t some false boogieman sowing anxieties among native Washingtonians. It’s a very real thing. Those two studies measure gentrification differently, but both singled out Washington, D.C., as ground zero: The city has undergone one of the most starkly visible demographic transformations in the country. And where gentrification has hit hard, populations of color have bled out. The D.C. Policy Center found the white population in Shaw grew tenfold since 1970, as its overall population doubled. The share of non-Hispanic whites went from 11 percent in 1970 to 62 percent in 2015.

D.C., then, offers a way to examine what this kind of gentrification actually means, and why it causes such anxiety. Why did this store—at the edge of a neighborhood that’s already on the far side of gentrification—touch such a nerve? And what does the reaction tell us about the way we talk (and don’t talk) about gentrification, in D.C. and around the country?

Read more: What D.C.’s Go-Go Showdown Reveals About Gentrification | CityLab
Related: Goodbye to Chocolate City | David Rusk

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D.C. Policy Center


Established in 2016, the D.C. Policy Center is a non-partisan research and policy organization committed to advancing policies for a strong and vibrant economy in the District of Columbia. Through rigorous research and collaboration, the D.C. Policy Center develops and tests policy ideas, disseminates its findings, and engages in constructive dialogue and debate.

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