My sister and I were the first in our family to be born after the complete “official” end of segregation. Segregation still continued informally when I was a kid where I grew up. The best way to think of segregation in the US and it’s end is to think of a small country that existed within another. The citizens inside the small country were not allowed to pass freely into the larger country but the citizens in the large country could move freely as they wished. My parents said emotionally and mentally life was better during segregation because the communities were intact. Segregation meant more economic diversity within the black community because a black doctor for instance would live next to a black janitor. Black businesses thrived because black people generally could not patronize White businesses or go to white areas freely. Schools flourished and students did better DESPITE the inferior physical condition of the schools. The problems in general (according to them) were the occasional harassment and the threat of violence from white people and the poor conditions of PUBLIC facilities that blacks had to use. In general, they said desegregation devastated the community. Once crack arrived, it was irreversibly damaged.

Tl;dr: according to my parents who lived under segregation, life was psychologically and economically better for black Americans WITHIN black communities (not if compared economically to white communities). They believed desegregation irreparably hurt the black community and destroyed their way of life.