or federated metropolitan government system, (3) an expansion of single-purpose regional authorities, (4) increases in informal cooperation by local governments and across the public, private, and voluntary sectors, (5) federal government incentives, sanctions, or mandates to bring about greater metropolitan-area cooperation, and (6) state government activity, including changing the legal framework within which local government operates to reduce its potential for exclusionary action (acting in its constitutional capacity as the regulator of local government activity) and other policies to promote reduction of extreme inequalities of opportunity in metropolitan areas. In each case, the questions are whether the development of the. counterfactual is politically plausible; whether, even if it were to occur, it would address effectively the problem of extreme inequality of opportunity; and, finally, what would be the cost to other important social objectives, such as efficiency, choice, accountability, and local autonomy.

Chapter 2 examines the broad context in which the problem of substantial inequality of opportunity in metropolitan areas occurs and discusses why it is a problem of national concern. It examines the spatial distribution of population in metropolitan areas in the United States, describes the distribution of population between central cities and suburbs and the degree of racial and economic segregation in metropolitan areas, and examines the causes of this pattern of spatial distribution. The chapter ends by examining the extent to which central cities and suburbs are interdependent and whether there is still an economic rationale for the central city.

Chapter 3 begins with the evidence for disparities in important outcomes of well-being between central-city and suburban residents and between whites and minority groups. It goes on to relate these disparities to the spatial opportunity structure in metropolitan areas. The task is to examine the causes of these disparities, assessing the extent to which they are due to metropolitan phenomena and particularly unequal spatial opportunity structures; we also consider the spatial components of causes of unequal opportunity less directly related to metropolitan phenomena. The next section reports calculations prepared at the committee's request on the costs to the nation, and to the suburbs, of the problems of central cities and their residents. Finally, the chapter examines disparities in the fiscal capacities of jurisdictions in the same manner, as special problems created by unequal spatial opportunity structures.

Chapter 4 reviews various strategies that have been tried or proposed to alter the spatial distribution of population, reduce outcome disparities between residents of central cities and suburbs and between non-Hispanic whites and minority groups, reduce tax/service disparities among local jurisdictions within metropolitan areas, and improve metropolitan governance.

Chapter 5 sets forth the committee's recommendations for research and discusses policy choices, based on our review of the literature.