IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/jeclit/v56y2018i1p206-16.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Review Essay on Howard Bodenhorn's The Color Factor: The Economics of African-American Well-Being in the Nineteenth-Century South

Author

Listed:
  • Allison Shertzer

Abstract

In The Color Factor: The Economics of African-American Well-Being in the Nineteenth-Century South, Howard Bodenhorn investigates the origins, health, and socioeconomic performance of mixed-race people in the antebellum Southern United States. The central conclusion of the book is that mixed-race people fared better than darker-skinned blacks on nearly every dimension; however, they were still disadvantaged relative to whites. This review essay discusses the book's valuable data contributions and relates Bodenhorn's conclusions to the broader literature on colorism. I close with implications for future research on the economics of skin color.

Suggested Citation

  • Allison Shertzer, 2018. "A Review Essay on Howard Bodenhorn's The Color Factor: The Economics of African-American Well-Being in the Nineteenth-Century South," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 56(1), pages 206-216, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:aea:jeclit:v:56:y:2018:i:1:p:206-16
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/jel.20161375
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jel.20161375
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles/attachments?retrieve=oEu0CQ4gWjNhHTyQY0oGMZ6wITZLVQXM
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
    • J15 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • J71 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - Hiring and Firing
    • N31 - Economic History - - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy - - - U.S.; Canada: Pre-1913

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aea:jeclit:v:56:y:2018:i:1:p:206-16. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.