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Racial and Ethnic Discrimination in Local Consumer Markets: Exploiting the Army’s Procedures for Matching Personnel to Duty Locations

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  • Antecol, Heather

    (Claremont McKenna College)

  • Cobb-Clark, Deborah A.

    (University of Sydney)

Abstract

We use the exogenous assignment of Army personnel to duty locations to analyze the relationship between the characteristics of local markets and the propensity for consumers to be subjected to racial discrimination in their everyday commercial transactions. Overall, one in ten soldiers report that they or their families have experienced racial discrimination in finding non-government housing or in patronizing businesses in their local communities. Discrimination is related to a community’s demographic profile with white and Asian soldiers feeling more unwelcome in local businesses as the local population becomes more heavily weighted towards other groups. Moreover, there is evidence that increased economic vulnerability in the community results in more housing discrimination amongst minorities. While the evidence that increased competition reduces consumer market discrimination is mixed, it is clear that discrimination is related to the nature of a soldier’s interaction with the local community.

Suggested Citation

  • Antecol, Heather & Cobb-Clark, Deborah A., 2006. "Racial and Ethnic Discrimination in Local Consumer Markets: Exploiting the Army’s Procedures for Matching Personnel to Duty Locations," IZA Discussion Papers 2389, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp2389
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    Cited by:

    1. Caitlin Knowles Myers & Marcus Bellows & Hiba Fakhoury & Douglas Hale & Alexander Hall & Kaitlin Ofman, 2010. "Ladies first? A field study of discrimination in coffee shops," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(14), pages 1761-1769.
    2. Scott Carrell & Jonathan Zinman, 2014. "In Harm's Way? Payday Loan Access and Military Personnel Performance," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(9), pages 2805-2840.
    3. Hanson, Andrew & Hawley, Zackary, 2011. "Do landlords discriminate in the rental housing market? Evidence from an internet field experiment in US cities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 99-114.
    4. Roca, Jorge De la & Ellen, Ingrid Gould & Steil, Justin, 2018. "Does segregation matter for Latinos?," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 129-141.
    5. Hamermesh, Daniel S. & Biddle, Jeff E., 2018. "Taking Time Use Seriously: Income, Wages and Price Discrimination," IZA Discussion Papers 11997, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Mariano Bosch & M. Belen Cobacho, 2012. "Discrimination in second-hand consumer markets: evidence from a field experiment," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(17), pages 1727-1730.
    7. Antecol, Heather & Cobb-Clark, Deborah A., 2010. "The effect of community-level socio-economic conditions on threatening racial encounters," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 517-529, November.
    8. Antecol, Heather & Cobb-Clark, Deborah A., 2008. "Identity and racial harassment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 66(3-4), pages 529-557, June.
    9. Anne Portlock, 2022. "Nurses without Borders: The Impact of Licensing Barriers on Employment," Working Papers 2022-03, Department of Economics and Geosciences, US Air Force Academy.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    discrimination; U.S. military; economics of minorities; consumer markets;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J15 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D40 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - General

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