The role of tech workers in ethnicity- and class-based urban segregation

Large cities are often segregated by both ethnicity and class, and these dimensions frequently overlap because minorities are over-represented in lower-paid occupations. We examine how these patterns shift during the course of digital-transition-driven professionalization by focusing on tech workers, a fast-growing professional group. Higher earnings and broad scope for remote work expand minority tech workers’ residential options relative to other minorities facing tighter housing constraints. What remains unclear is whether their residential sorting is driven primarily by ethnicity or by class. Our empirical evidence comes from Tallinn, the capital of Estonia—a country known for its digital advancement. On the basis of population-wide register data, we find that the residential outcomes of minority tech workers align with class position, paralleled by the increasing spatial isolation of non-tech minorities as upward occupational mobility draws minority professionals out of lower-income co-ethnic areas. These results underscore the need to design urban policy for digitally transforming and professionalizing cities, with explicit attention to class-based segregation risks among minority communities who gain less from new opportunities. Cities are often segregated by class and ethnicity, with work often playing a key role. Focusing on digitally advanced Tallinn, Estonia, this study finds that minority tech workers are less segregated from the majority whereas non-tech workers are more isolated, deepening class-based segregation.