The information theory of segregation: uniting segregation and inequality in a common framework

Abstract

Drawing on insights from Shannon's (1948) seminal paper on Information Theory, we propose that all measures of segregation and inequality are united within a single conceptual framework. We argue that segregation is fundamentally analogous to the loss of information from an aggregation process. Integration is information loss and segregation is information retention. Specifying the exact theoretical and mathematical relationship between inequality and segregation measures is useful for several reasons. It highlights the common mathematical structure shared by many different segregation measures, and it suggests certain useful variants of these measures that have not been recognized previously. We develop several new measures, including a Gini Segregation Index (GS) for continuous variables and Income Dissimilarity (ID), a version of the Index of Dissimilarity suitable for measuring economic segregation. We also show that segregation measures can easily be adapted to handle persons of mixed race, and describe the Non-Exclusive Index of Dissimilarity (NED) and the Non-Exclusive Entropy Index of Segregation (NEH). We also develop a correction for structural constraints on the value of segregation measures, comparable to capacity constraints in a communications channel, that prevent them reaching their theoretical maximum or minimum value.

Income Segregation Analysis in Limited‐Data Contexts: A Methodology Based on Iterative Proportional Fitting

“…Global measures are the most common type of index in the literature and include the widely used Dissimilarity Index and the Information Entropy Index (see Massey and Denton 1988 for a discussion on classical indexes of segregation). More recent global indexes address the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem (MAUP) (Stewart Fotheringham and Wong 1991; Wong 2004b) and the spatial composition of group membership (Reardon and O'Sullivan 2004; Jargowsky and Kim 2009). In the 2000s, Reardon and Wong proposed global indexes that standardize the aerial unit and define the ordinal structure of income reported as the number of people within each category (Wong 2003, 2004a; Reardon 2009, 2011).…”

Income Inequality and Residential Segregation in “Egalitarian” Sweden: Lessons from a Least Likely Case

“…Middle-class flight by socially mobile minorities, driven by increasing suburbanization and an expanding middle class, is one of the reasons for the increasing income segregation among black and Hispanic families (Wilson 2011). Over the years, increasing income segregation among these racial groups, along with persistent racially patterned neighborhood sorting, have contributed to the increasing isolation of poor black and Hispanic communities (Jargowsky 2018;Rothwell and Massey 2010).…”

When Environmental Inequality Racialized: Historical Evidence from Providence, Rhode Island

“…1 Among 209 metropolitan areas with populations of more than 200,000, just 40 have become less segregated since 1990, while more than 80 percent (169) have grown more segregated (Menendian et al 2021;Othering & Belonging Institute 2022a). Overall, racial and ethnic residential segregation remains high (Faber 2020;Krysan and Crowder 2017) and complex changes in income-based segregation have been shown to interact with racial and ethnic settlement patterns in ways that both complicate and reinforce enduring urban racial and ethnic inequality (Jargowsky 2018;Logan, Foster et al 2020).…”