CensusScope -- Segregation: Dissimilarity Indices

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	Exposure by Race
	Dissimilarity Indices

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CensusScope is a product of the Social Science Data Analysis Network.

New Orleans city

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SEGREGATION: DISSIMILARITY INDICES

The dissimilarity index measures the relative separation or integration of groups across all neighborhoods of a city or metropolitan area. If a city's white-black dissimilarity index were 65, that would mean that 65% of white people would need to move to another neighborhood to make whites and blacks evenly distributed across all neighborhoods.

Dissimilarity Indices
	Dissimilarity Index		Percent of
	With Whites*	Population**	Total Population
White*	--	128,871	26.59%
Black*	70.6	323,392	66.72%
American Indian*	59.8	852	0.18%
Asian*	66.1	10,919	2.25%
Native Hawaiian*	87.8	88	0.02%
Other*	65.4	961	0.20%
Two or More Races*	48.2	4,765	0.98%
White/Black*	66.2	930	0.19%
White/American Indian*	56.7	490	0.10%
White/Asian*	56.6	559	0.12%
White/Other*	60.3	793	0.16%
Other Combinations*	--	1,993	0.41%
Hispanic	41.2	14,826	3.06%
Total	--	484,674	100.00%

* Non-Hispanic only.

* When a group's population is small, its dissimilarity index may be high even if the group's members are evenly distributed throughout the area. Thus, when a group's population is less than 1,000, exercise caution in interpreting its dissimilarity indices.

Source: William H. Frey and Dowell Myers' analysis of Census 2000; and the Social Science Data Analysis Network (SSDAN).

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