After decades of narrowing, the achievement gap between black and white school children widened in the 1990s a period when the labor market rewards for education were increasing. This presents an important puzzle for economists. In this chapter, I investigate the extent to which economic models...

Income inequality is a critical issue in both political and public debate. Educational attainment is a key causal factor of continuing inequality, since it influences human capital accumulation and, as a consequence, the unequal distribution of earnings. Educational inequality displays a racial...

This paper examines racial and ethnic differences in high cost mortgage lending in seven diverse metropolitan areas from 2004-2007. Even after controlling for credit score and other key risk factors, African-American and Hispanic home buyers are 105 and 78 percent more likely to have high cost...

In this replication study, we revisit the main empirical claims of Hamel and Wilcox-Archuleta's (HW) 2022 study on the impact of daytime racial diversity on White Americans' voting behavior and racial attitudes. HW introduce a novel zip code level measure of racial diversity that accounts for...

We examine the impact of local racial demonstrations, such as Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests, and the subsequent racial justice movement following the death of George Floyd on racial disparities in Paycheck Protection Program loan disbursements to small businesses. Using...

A half a century has passed since the landmark decision Brown v. Board of Education (1954) overturned the doctrine of separate but equal in the realm of public education. This chapter attempts to summarize what we know about the impact of Brown on enrollment patterns and academic and economic...

Many small businesses have closed, lost revenues, or downsized as a response to health and economic disruptions caused by COVID-19. But, were economic losses in the pandemic disproportionately felt by businesses owned by people of color? This paper provides the first study of the impacts of...

Whether contemporary households consider the race of their neighbors when choosing a neighborhood is controversial. We study neighborhood choice using a novel research design that contrasts the move rate of homeowners who receive a new different-race neighbor nearby to that of homeowners who...