How do ethnic religious organizations influence immigrants' assimilation in host societies? This paper offers the first systematic answer to this question by focusing on Italian Catholic churches in the US between 1890 and 1920, when four million Italians moved to America, and anti-Catholic...

Prior to the racial integration of schools in the southern United States, predominantly African American schools were staffed almost exclusively by African American teachers as well, and teaching constituted an extraordinarily large share of professional employment among southern blacks. The...

The rate at which racial gaps in pre-collegiate academic achievement can plausibly be expected to erode is a matter of great interest and much uncertainty. In her opinion in Grutter v. Bollinger, Supreme Court Justice O'Connor took a firm stand: "We expect that 25 years from now, the use of...

Recent research shows the negative impact of discrimination not only on the targets of discrimination but also on the economy as a whole. Racial and gender inequality can limit the entire economy's productive capacity and innovation outcomes. Using new data from NSF's Survey of Earned Doctorates...

Between 1940 and 1970, more than 4 million African Americans moved from the South to the North of the United States, during the Second Great Migration. This same period witnessed the struggle and eventual success of the civil rights movement in ending institutionalized racial discrimination....

Although there is a large gap between Black and White American life expectancies, the gap fell 48.9% between 1990-2018, mainly due to mortality declines among Black Americans. We examine age-specific mortality trends and racial gaps in life expectancy in rich and poor U.S. areas and with...

Using new large-scale survey and experimental data, we investigate how respondents perceive racial inequities between Black and white Americans, what they believe causes them, and what interventions, if any, they think should be implemented to reduce them. We intentionally oversample Black...

We document the existence of a racial gap in realized housing returns that is an order of magnitude larger than disparities arising from housing costs alone, and is driven almost entirely by differences in distressed home sales (i.e. foreclosures and short sales). Black and Hispanic homeowners...

We develop a theoretical model to explain both the high level and persistence in gun violence for black males ages 15-24 consistent with the empirical literature. A person may carry a gun for instrumental (i.e., criminal) reasons or for its perceived protective benefit. Discerning underlying...

We construct a measure of consumption-equivalent welfare for Black and White Americans. Our statistic incorporates life expectancy, consumption, leisure, and inequality, with mortality rates playing a key role quantitatively. According to our estimates, welfare for Black Americans was 43% of...