Check out the article “More than economics: New book explores how equality helps economies grow” featured on the University of California Santa Cruz news site.  Many readers may be familiar with the fact that co-author Chris Benner is a professor and director of the Everett Program at UCSC. But as Melissa De Witte pointed out, co-author Manuel Pastor also has deep connections to UCSC as an alumnus and former professor.

“In their research, Benner and Pastor visited 11 regions across the U.S. to better understand how a community responded to specific issues choking growth. A jobs crisis, political fragmentation, education and income disparities, or all of the above – present new problems to communities. How quickly cities respond to these challenges is related to how equal and epistemic its community is….

…’We find that one of the most important factors that can shorten a growth spell is a region’s initial level of inequality,’ say Benner and Pastor. ‘We also find that measures of social cohesion, including residential segregation, fragmented metropolitan governance, and sharp difference in city-suburb poverty levels, all play a role.’”

Read the full post.