by Kevin Schofield

This weekend’s read is a fascinating deep dive into the social isolation of America’s economic classes. It’s been known for a while that we’re seeing increasing levels of segregation by income in our residential neighborhoods, schools, and work sites, but this new study by researchers at the Naval Postgraduate School and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology looks at how much income segregation there is while we go about our daily activities: shopping, eating out, going to church, visiting the library, walking through the park, etc. These “third places,” as sociologists like to call them (as opposed to home and work), make up a large portion of the time we interact with other people, so it’s important to understand whether they are bringing us together or further isolating us.