Mechanisms for increased school segregation relative to residential segregation: a model-based analysis

Excess school segregation is a phenomena observed across many countries and one common explanation from the literature is the hypothesis that parents might want to live in a diverse neighbourhood, but when it comes to their children, they are less tolerant with respect to school compositions. This study uses an agent-based model where households face residential decisions depending on neighbourhood compositions and make school choices based on distance and school compositions. Results indicate that increased school segregation relative to residential segregation can be observed in large parts of the parameter space, even when the tolerance for households belonging to the other group is equal for neighbourhood and school compositions. Our results demonstrate that asymmetric preferences are not a requirement for excess school segregation and show that residential segregation combined with distance preferences play a key role in this increase.