"The town coordinate, the city coordinate, the suburb coordinate—these are the maps of the new segregation... The suburbanites, who are the leaders of the economic and social life of the city, flee the city at the end of the day. They do not walk its streets, they do not see its slums, they do not know its problems. By moving to the suburbs, they have signed a treaty of peace with their own consciences, leaving the central city to decay."
— Michael Harrington, *The Other America*, 1962
Which of the following historical developments during the 1950s and 1960s most directly contributed to the social and economic isolation of the urban poor described in the excerpt?
- The allocation of federal subsidies for highway construction and home mortgages that disproportionately benefited middle-class families moving out of urban centers.Cevap
- BThe implementation of Great Society programs that concentrated federal funding in suburban public schools rather than inner-city neighborhoods.
- CThe federal government's strict adherence to laissez-faire principles, which prevented any regulation or financing of local housing developments.
- DThe prioritization of containment-related military expenditures over domestic infrastructure, which halted all federal transportation funding.
Cevap
The allocation of federal subsidies for highway construction and home mortgages that disproportionately benefited middle-class families moving out of urban centers.
The correct option is correct because the migration of middle-class families to the suburbs was heavily subsidized by the federal government through FHA mortgage guarantees and the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act of 1956. These programs made suburban living affordable and accessible for many, while concurrently facilitating the disinvestment in and demographic isolation of inner-city areas.
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Anahtar Kavram
Postwar suburbanization and the demographic divide between urban centers and suburban areas, driven by federal policy and middle-class migration.