Equity and Urban Policy: The Underclass Hypothesis Revisited

It is premature to reject Lineberry's underclass hypothesis because the internal validity in most previous studies which test it is suspect. With data on the distribution of police expenditures in Boston, Massachusetts in 1971, the authors demonstrate that the methodology employed in analyzing municipal service distributions largely determines the findings. When the internal validity of the research design is improved, the authors find support for both the race preference and power elite aspects of the hypothesis. These findings warrant the exhumation of the underclass hypothesis for further analysis.