Segregation of poor and minority population in urban ghettos

The assimilation of newcomers into urban areas has to be assisted by the inhabitants already there, who must nevertheless compete with those they help for the same unskilled or semi-skilled jobs. The friction thus engendered is compounded in the current situation by the existence of prejudice against minority groups. Largely middle-class populations have felt their property and person to be threatened by peoples of a different colour or ethnic group, and have moved to the suburbs, where they now defy others to follow. What used to be a socially and ethnically diverse population living in districts or 'villages' within the central areas of cities has become a more homogeneous population consisting mainly of less educated minority groups often demoralized by their lack of occupational opportunities, by substandard housing conditions, and by the general deterioration of living conditions in the city centre. Even where actual prejudice does not exist, cultural and educational differences stimulate urban middle-income families to seek out suburban neighbours like themselves.