Stuck in the past
Past Place, Present Prejudice: The Impact of Adolescent Racial Context on White Racial Attitudes
Seth Goldman & Daniel Hopkins
Journal of Politics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Extensive research on racial contexts suggests that white Americans living near black Americans adopt more negative racial attitudes. Theoretically, local inter-group exposure has been conceptualized as acting contemporaneously through various mechanisms. However, a separate body of research on political socialization indicates that adolescent experiences are often especially influential. We hypothesize that whites' racial contexts during adolescence produce prejudiced responses. We then test this hypothesis using two complimentary data sets, a population-based panel conducted between 2007 and 2013 and the Youth-Parent Socialization Panel Survey (1965-1997). Our analyses demonstrate the enduring influence of adolescent contexts at larger levels of aggregation: while the racial composition of whites' current counties is not a consistent predictor of racial prejudice, the racial composition of their county during high school is. Proximity during one's formative years increases racial prejudice years later, providing new insights about local contextual effects and the roots of racial prejudice.
Determining our destiny: Do restrictions to collective autonomy fuel collective action?
Frank Kachanoff et al.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Groups experience collective autonomy restriction whenever they perceive that other groups attempt to limit the freedom of their group to determine and express its own identity. We argue that collective autonomy restriction motivates groups (both structurally advantaged and disadvantaged) to improve their power position within the social hierarchy. Four studies spanning real-world (Studies 1 and 2) and lab-based (Studies 3 and 4) intergroup contexts supported these ideas. In Study 1 (N = 311), Black Americans’ (a relatively disadvantaged group) experience of collective autonomy restriction was associated with greater support for collective action, and less system justification. In Study 2, we replicated these findings with another sample of Black Americans (N = 292). We also found that collective autonomy restriction was positively associated with White Americans’ (a relatively advantaged group, N = 294) support for collective action and ideologies that bolster White’s dominant position. In Study 3 (N = 387, 97 groups), groups that were susceptible to being controlled by a high-power group (i.e., were of low structural power) desired group power more when their collective autonomy was restricted (vs. supported). In Study 4 (N = 803, 257 groups) experiencing collective autonomy restriction (vs. support) increased low-power group members’ support of collective action, decreased system justification, and evoked hostile emotions, both when groups were and were not materially exploited (by being tasked with more than their fair share of work). Across studies, we differentiate collective autonomy restriction from structural group power, other forms of injustice, group agency, and group identification. These findings indicate that collective autonomy restriction uniquely motivates collective behavior.
Historic Lynching and Corporal Punishment in Contemporary Southern Schools
Geoff Ward et al.
Social Problems, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study examines how corporal punishment in contemporary public schools, a disciplinary practice concentrated in southeastern U.S. states, relates to histories of lynching in the region. Using school-level data from the U.S. Department of Education, we examine these relationships in a series of multi-level regression models. After controlling for numerous school- and county-level factors, we find an increased likelihood of corporal punishment for all students in counties where greater numbers of lynchings occurred, and that lynching is particularly predictive of corporal punishment for black students. Consistent with prior research associating historic lynching with contemporary violence, these results suggest general and race-specific legacies for violent school discipline. We consider potential mechanisms linking histories of lynching with school corporal punishment, and implications for research and policy.
From Plantations to Prisons: The Legacy of Slavery on Black Incarceration in the US
Melissa Rubio
University of Gothenburg Working Paper, November 2019
Abstract:
Black males constitute 6.5% of the US population but account for 40% of the prison population. The extent to which these disparities reflect differences in criminal conduct and socio-economic background, as opposed to differential treatment is a long-standing question. However, little is known about the roots of this disparity. This paper uses US decennial censuses for the period 1850 to 1940 to show that the race gap in incarceration can be traced back to the abolition of slavery in 1865. In particular, I exploit the variation in the prevalence of slavery across counties in southern states to estimate the short- and long-run impact of slavery on black incarceration rates. I document a substantial increase in black incarceration immediately after the abolition of slavery, with no comparable effect on whites, and that this black-white incarceration gap continued to grow. These baseline OLS results are not driven by omitted variables given their robustness to: (i) observable controls, which proxy for racial attitudes and socioeconomic and geographic characteristics, (ii) analyses of neighboring counties that are more likely to be comparable on unobservable dimensions, and (iii) an IV analysis that instruments for slavery intensity with cotton suitability. Using novel historical data on prison work camps from the Department of Labor, I provide evidence that the high levels of black incarceration in the US started, at least in part, due to labor scarcity in which convict labor was used to replace slave labor. This mechanism is further supported in analyses of three natural experiments -- land grant allocations, Boll Weevil cotton pests, and the Mississippi River floods -- that reduced the demand for labor; these reverse shocks are associated with lower black incarceration rates.
The Assessment Gap: Racial Inequalities in Property Taxation
Carlos Avenancio-Leon & Troup Howard
University of California Working Paper, November 2019
Abstract:
We use panel data covering 118 million homes in the United States, merged with geolocation detail for 75,000 taxing entities, to document a nationwide "assessment gap" which leads local governments to place a disproportionate fiscal burden on racial and ethnic minorities. We show that holding jurisdictions and property tax rates fixed, black and Hispanic residents face a 10-13% higher tax burden for the same bundle of public services. This assessment gap arises through two channels. First, property assessments are less sensitive to neighborhood attributes than market prices are. This generates racially correlated spatial variation in tax burden within jurisdiction. Second, appeals behavior and appeals outcomes differ by race. This results in higher assessment growth rates for minority residents. We propose an alternate approach for constructing assessments based on small-geography home price indexes, and show that this reduces inequality by at least 55-70%.
Crossing the Color Line: The Effects of Racial Integration during the Korean War
Daniel Indacochea
University of Toronto Working Paper, November 2019
Abstract:
The racial integration of the US Army during the Korean War (1950-1953) is one of the largest and swiftest desegregation episodes in American history. This paper argues that racial integration improved white survival rates at the expense of blacks, and resulted in less anti-black prejudice among white veterans decades after the war. Using a novel military casualty file, I construct a wartime similarity index to measure the extent of racial integration across military units and time. Using exogenous changes in racial integration, I show that integrated whites were 3% more likely to survive their injuries than segregated whites, whereas integrated blacks were 2% were less likely to survive their injuries than segregated blacks. Given that blacks were initially confined to noncombat support roles, the results reflect a convergence in hazardous combat assignments. To explore the long-term effects of racial integration, I link individual soldiers to post-war social security and cemetery data using an unsupervised learning algorithm. With these matched samples, I show that a standard deviation change in the wartime racial integration caused white veterans to live in more racially diverse neighborhoods and marry non-white spouses. In aggregate, these results are some of the first and only examples of large-scale interracial contact reducing prejudice on a long-term basis.
What Determines Social Capital? Evidence from Slavery’s Legacy in the United States and Brazil
Matthew Uttermark
Social Forces, forthcoming
Abstract:
What determines social capital? Prior scholarship has examined what causes social capital to change contemporaneously but has yet to assess how history influenced social capital’s development. Building on previous research, which posits that former slaveholding regions exhibit lower levels of social capital, I test two competing explanations of how social capital developed. The inequality hypothesis argues that a reliance on plantation slavery created economic inequality, which in turn diminished modern social capital; the attitudinal hypothesis argues that the abolition of slavery influenced mass political attitudes, which have transmitted over generations and diminished modern social capital. To test which is correct, I examine slavery’s impact on social capital, measured as interpersonal trust, in two countries — the United States and Brazil. I find evidence that slavery is negatively associated with social capital; an individual’s support for interpersonal trust can decrease by as much as 18 percent in regions with high levels of former slavery. Moreover, it is the attitudinal hypothesis — not economic inequality — which associates with social capital’s decline.
Racial Disparities in Debt Collection
Jessica LaVoice & Domonkos Vamossy
University of Pittsburgh Working Paper, September 2019
Abstract:
A distinct set of disadvantages experienced by black Americans increases their likelihood of experiencing negative financial shocks, decreases their ability to mitigate the impact of such shocks, and ultimately results in debt collection cases being far more common in black neighborhoods than in non-black neighborhoods. In this paper, we create a novel data-set that links debt collection court cases with information from credit reports to document the disparity in debt collection judgments across black and non-black neighborhoods and to explore potential mechanisms that could be driving this judgment gap. We find that majority black neighborhoods experience approximately 40% more judgments than non-black neighborhoods, even after controlling for differences in median incomes, median credit scores, and default rates. The racial disparity in judgments cannot be explained by differences in debt characteristics across black and non-black neighborhoods, nor can it be explained by differences in attorney representation, the share of contested judgments, or differences in neighborhood lending institutions.
Social Networks and the Demand for News
Lisa George & Christian Peukert
Information Economics and Policy, forthcoming
Abstract:
Economic research has documented a robust, positive relationship between media consumption among minority individuals and the size of the minority population in local markets. The theoretical mechanism behind these “preference externaltities” has been understood to be the supply incentive to cater to large groups when fixed costs or other scale economies limit the number of viable products in a local market. We demonstrate that the supply-side mechanism is incomplete: the relationship holds not just for local but also national news outlets. We extend the concept of preference externalities to the demand side, establishing a relationship between the racial composition of local communities and the tendency to seek and share information on online social networks. Using data from a sample of 35,997 internet households and a sample of 11,479 Twitter users, we show that a larger local black population is associated with both larger network size and higher utilization for individual black Twitter users relative to white Twitter users and vice versa. Our results suggest that digitization can exacerbate inequality in news consumption, but also that policies to widen broadband access might narrow the gap.
Kin location and racial disparities in exiting and entering poor neighborhoods
Elizabeth Ackert et al.
Social Science Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Blacks and Latinos/as are less likely than Whites to move from a poor neighborhood to a non-poor neighborhood and are more likely to move in the reverse direction. Using individual-level data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (1980–2013) and neighborhood-level census data, this study explores the role that the spatial location of familial kin networks plays in explaining these racially and ethnically disparate mobility patterns. Blacks and Latinos/as live closer than Whites to nuclear kin, and they are also more likely than Whites to have kin members living in poor neighborhoods. Close geographic proximity to kin and higher levels of kin neighborhood poverty inhibit moving from a poor to a non-poor neighborhood, and increase the risk of moving from a non-poor to a poor tract. Racial/ethnic differences in kin proximity and kin neighborhood poverty explain a substantial portion of racial gaps in exiting and entering poor neighborhoods.
The Dynamics of the Racial Wealth Gap
Dionissi Aliprantis, Daniel Carroll & Eric Young
Federal Reserve Working Paper, October 2019
Abstract:
We reconcile the large and persistent racial wealth gap with the smaller racial earnings gap, using a general equilibrium heterogeneous-agents model that matches racial differences in earnings, wealth, bequests, and returns to savings. Given initial racial wealth inequality in 1962, our model attributes the slow convergence of the racial wealth gap primarily to earnings, with much smaller roles for bequests or returns to savings. Cross-sectional regressions of wealth on earnings using simulated data produce the same racial gap documented in the literature. One-time wealth transfers have only transitory effects unless they address the racial earnings gap.
Democratization, De Facto Power, and Taxation: Evidence from Military Occupation during Reconstruction
Mario Chacón & Jeffrey Jensen
World Politics, forthcoming
Abstract:
How important is the enforcement of political rights in new democracies? The authors use the enfranchisement of the emancipated slaves following the American Civil War to study this question. Critical to their strategy, black suffrage was externally enforced by the United States Army in ten Southern states during Reconstruction. The authors employ a triple-difference model to estimate the joint effect of enfranchisement and its enforcement on taxation. They find that counties with greater black-population shares that were occupied by the military levied higher taxes compared to similar nonoccupied counties. These counties later experienced a comparatively greater decline in taxation after the troops were withdrawn. The authors also demonstrate that in occupied counties, black politicians were more likely to be elected and political murders by white supremacist groups occurred less frequently. The findings provide evidence on the key role of federal troops in limiting elite capture by force during this period.
Water Purification Efforts and the Black-White Infant Mortality Gap, 1906-1938
Mark Anderson et al.
NBER Working Paper, November 2019
Abstract:
According to Troesken (2004), efforts to purify municipal water supplies at the turn of the 20th century dramatically improved the relative health of blacks. There is, however, little empirical evidence to support the Troesken hypothesis. Using city-level data published by the U.S. Bureau of the Census for the period 1906-1938, we explore the relationship between water purification efforts and the black-white infant mortality gap. Our results suggest that, while water filtration was effective across the board, adding chlorine to the water supply reduced mortality only among black infants. Specifically, chlorination is associated with an 11 percent reduction in black infant mortality and a 13 percent reduction in the black-white infant mortality gap. We also find that chlorination led to a substantial reduction in the black-white diarrhea mortality gap among children under the age of 2, although this estimate is measured with less precision.