What is Gentrification?

As a general rule, an area is considered to have experienced gentrification when its median household incomes and home values have escalated from below the 40th percentile for the city as a whole into the top third percentile… About 29.8% of New York City is gentrified.   (http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/25/opinion/the-gentrification-effect.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fthomas-b-edsall&action=click&contentCollection=Opinion&module=Collection&region=Marginalia&src=me&pgtype=article&_r=0).

But what is gentrification?

Gentrification comes from the root “gentry,” which means a people of a specified class or group. Upscale gentrifiers move in and resettle once declining inner-city areas. The process of gentrification is the transformation of central neighborhoods in regard to its socio-economic composition. These areas become more accommodating to the professional class, and less of a focus on the working class. This causes these inner-city areas to become less racially diverse and more homogenous.

Developers with help from the city promote gentrification and take advantage of low property values. This is because of the view that the city is a “growth machine” and it should attract new businesses by creating new housing, entertainment, shopping, and restaurants. The developers and real estate agents actually have a pivotal role in the neighborhood’s transformation (Ross and Levine, 54). They brand the area and attract students and artist who are looking for a place that provides cheap rent, a close proximity to their work, and vibrant culture.

As the word of this “gritty,” cool, and recently “discovered” area becomes more well known, more and more affluent people, yuppies–young urban professionals–move into the area, causing the original poor inhabitants to be displaced. In fact, according to geographers Elvin K Wyly and Daniel Hammel, gentrification has increased segregation and worsened the process of racial and ethnic discrimination. So much so that as of 2005, New York City was more segregated than it had been in 1910 (Center for Social Inclusion, 2005).