Enterprise Zones: The Non-Manipulation of Economic Space

In 1982 and 1983, legislation to establish enterprise zones in the United States was placed before Congress. The spatially targeted program is designed to stimulate economic growth in depressed inner cities. Yet an assessment of the probable spatial consequences of the zones at various scales and of their potential for affecting significant change in economic space indicates that the program is likely to do little to modify the current dynamics of metropolitan economies. Instead, enterprise zones will increase inter- and intra-state competition for investment, with only minor modification in socioeconomic equity.