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A Cure for Discrimination? Affirmative Action and the Case of California Proposition 209

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Author Info
Caitlin Knowles Myers () (Middlebury College and IZA Bonn)

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Abstract

Proposition 209, enacted in California in 1996 and made effective the following year, ended state affirmative action programs not only in education, but also for public employment and government contracting. This paper uses CPS data and triple difference techniques to take advantage of the natural experiment presented by this change in state law to gauge the labor market impacts of ending affirmative action programs. Employment among women and minorities dropped sharply, a change that was nearly completely explained by a decline in participation rather than by increases in unemployment. This decline suggests that either affirmative action programs in California had been inefficient or that they failed to create lasting change in prejudicial attitudes.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number 1674.

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Length: 31 pages
Date of creation: Jul 2005
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1674

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Related research
Keywords: economics of gender and minorities; affirmative action; Proposition 209; discrimination;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:
J71 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - Hiring and Firing
J78 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - Public Policy (including comparable worth)

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Susan Athey, 1998. "Mentoring and Diversity," Working papers 98-2, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Department of Economics.
    Other versions:
  2. Coate, Stephen & Loury, Glenn C, 1993. "Will Affirmative-Action Policies Eliminate Negative Stereotypes?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1220-40, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Morris Goldstein & Robert S. Smith, 1976. "The estimated impact of the antidiscrimination program aimed at federal contractors," Industrial and Labor Relations Review, ILR Review, ILR School, Cornell University, vol. 29(4), pages 523-543, July.
  4. Smith, James P & Welch, Finis, 1984. "Affirmative Action and Labor Markets," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(2), pages 269-301, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Mincer, Jacob, 1976. "Unemployment Effects of Minimum Wages," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 84(4), pages S87-104, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Ai, Chunrong & Norton, Edward C., 2003. "Interaction terms in logit and probit models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 80(1), pages 123-129, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Orley Ashenfelter & James J. Heckman, 1974. "Measuring the Effect of an Anti-Discrimination Program," NBER Working Papers 0050, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  8. Gruber, Jonathan, 1994. "The Incidence of Mandated Maternity Benefits," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(3), pages 622-41, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. H. Holzer & D. Neumark, . "Are affirmative action hires less qualified? Evidence from employer-employee data on new hires," Institute for Research on Poverty Discussion Papers 1113-96, University of Wisconsin Institute for Research on Poverty. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Hélène Perivier, 2007. "Les femmes sur le marché du travail aux États-Unis - Une mise en perspective avec la France et la Suède," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2007-07, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE). [Downloadable!]
  2. Hélène Périvier, 2008. "Les femmes sur le marché du travail aux États-Unis," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2008-12, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE). [Downloadable!]
  3. Peter J. Sloane & Suzanne Grazier & Richard J. Jones, 2005. "Preferences, Gender Segregation and Affirmative Action," IZA Discussion Papers 1881, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
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