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Title: Long-Run Differences in Wealth: A Microdata Analysis of US White-Black Differences in Wealth Directly After Mass Emancipation of Southern Slaves

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2002

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Abstract: This study analyzed racial inequality by decomposing historical black-white differences in wealth using regression decomposition. This technique decomposes economic differences into the portion explained by differences in characteristics and the unexplained portion due to different returns to a set of characteristics (See, e.g., Blinder 1973 and Oaxaca 1973). Preliminary results confirm that the size and source of contemporary black-whitewealth differences have historical roots: In 1870, at least 75 percent of white-black wealth differences were not explained by characteristic differences described by the classical model. This is consistent with wealthdecompositions of late-twentieth century data that show three-quarters of white-black differences were unexplained (See, e.g., Blau and Graham 1990). Furthermore, this study found that 77.8 percent of white-black wealthdifferences were not explained in states that abolished slavery well before the Civil War while 87.9 percent of whiteblack wealth differences were unexplained in states that abolished slavery after the Civil War. Key words:economic discrimination, regression decomposition, wealth inequality, and slavery.

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Authors: Curtis Jr, James E.

Publisher: The James Edward Curtis Jr Education Foundation

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Race and Ethnicity

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