City specific ‘racial threat’ can push neighborhood resources,like supermarkets, away from African Americans

Neighborhood resources – and areas with limited access to fresh produce (‘food deserts’) in particular – are important forms of inequality associated with the health outcomes of neighborhood residents. Applying ‘minority competition’ theory to neighborhood resource disparities, Jarrett Thibodeaux finds that the percentage of African Americans in a U.S. city predicts the placement of supermarkets near African Americans within the city. Other neighborhood resource disparities suffered by racial minorities may be caused by the ‘perceived threat to resources’ that a growing racial minority can provoke in the racial majority.