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Title: The Political Economy of the Second Migration: Fair Employment Laws and Black Interstate Migration Decisions, 1940-1970

Citation Type: Dissertation/Thesis

Publication Year: 2015

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Abstract: This paper examines the role of state fair employment laws in determining the destination choices of black migrants in the latter phase of the Great Migration. Although the timeframe of state-level fair employment enactment (1945-63) aligns well with that of the second migration (1940-70), there has not yet been an attempt to empirically examine the extent to which the laws attracted or deterred migrants. Using state-level data from the US Census and individual-level data from IPUMS USA samples for years 1940-70, I run a difference-in-difference-in-difference model to estimate the relationship between various measures of fair employment legislation and short-term and lifetime interstate migration for black and white men. I find that passage of fair employment legislation was the most effective at attracting black migrants in the middle of the period (roughly 1955-60), while passage decreased in deterministic power in the later years. In general, the earliest laws were not independently attractive at all, except when the sample is limited to the non-South. I find no evidence that older laws were more attractive than more recent laws -- for the period roughly 1955-1965, the existence of the legislation itself was sufficient to attract black migration.

Url: http://blogs.colgate.edu/economics/files/2015/05/Chao.-2015.pdf

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Authors: Chao, Kathy

Institution: Colgate University

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Publisher Location: Hamilton, New York

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Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Migration and Immigration, Race and Ethnicity

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