There are some efforts doing exactly this but it is not easy. Firstly you are taking tax money away from richer residents and giving to the poorer residents in a city which the rich residents do not like. They might do things like moving to another city reducing the tax income that is needed to pay for the improvements of the poorer areas.
But even when you try to improve a poor area there are lots of systemic issues that is harder to solve then just with a bit of money. You soon discover that nobody will go to the new schools and libraries that were built because they have to work for food because they do not have an education for a high skilled job. So you end up having to spend lots of money on school meals. Then you have people desperate for cash ending up breaking into the newly built institutions to steal whatever is worth something. So you need to spend money replacing broken and stolen equipment, hire security guards and build security barriers. You end up spending a lot more money on the same kind of care that would be required in richer parts of town.
And then you have all the social, mental and physical health issues as a result of growing up in a poor neighborhood to poor parents. Some of it might be what caused them to move there in the first place as they could not get a living wage with the health issues they had. A lot of these people will never be able to do well in life but you still need to help them so they do not ruin it for the rest and maybe give them a decent life.
And then when you are able to see some results from all your effort there are some people able to get a good education and end up in a high earning job. Then they have enough money to move across town where the view is better, the utilities are much better, the air is much cleaner and there are less noise. And people from these richer areas start coming to the poor neighborhoods looking for cheap housing as they have lost their jobs and have run through all their life savings for various reasons.
So while we are working on improving the poorer neighborhoods in cities it is an uphill battle. The best you can do is to somewhat equalize the quality of life in various parts of the city but you will never be able to eliminate it. The last bit to reach equality is very expensive and is not something our civilization wants. There have been several attempts at this in communist authoritarian countries and they have failed miserably when trying to create complete equality for everyone.
Latest Answers