Discrimination

1
Discrimination

• Theory and Measurement

2
Original Theories

• Marxist Discrimination a Smoke Screen
• Capitalists want to divide proletariat
• Do so by Race, Sex, Ethnicity
• Could be anything (earlobes?)
• Keeps workers at each others throats
• And away from their own
• Psychological A mistake
• People dont know truth about others
• Just have to educate them

3
Neoclassical Theory

• Basis of what we shall do
• Whats your favorite flavor of ice cream?
• Why?
• Can we make you change your mind?
• Prejudice is a taste
• Discrimination is indulging that taste
• Comes at a cost

4
Suppose I am Prejudiced
w

• I dont like blondes!
• Employing them brings a psychic cost
• As if paying them more
• wB(1d)w0
• Demand falls
• D feels like D
• Lets act this out

wB
D
w0
D
QB
5
Impact on Market

• How do blondes respond?
• Offer to work for less
• Wage falls
• What do employers do?
• Restrict choice of employees
• Productivity of favored workers may fall
• Forced to employ less productive workers
• Wages of favored workers driven up
• Supply of qualified workers artificially
  restricted

6
Who Gains and Who Loses?

• Blonde workers lose
• Fewer employed
• Wages lower
• Other workers win
• More employed
• Perhaps less qualified
• Wages higher
• Employers?

7
What About Employers?

• Trade off profit distaste for blondes
• UU(p,B)
• Indifference Curve
• p higher if hire blondes
• Lower pay
• Better Workers
• Sacrifice profit to indulge taste for
  discrimination

p
Blondes
8
Another Beneficiary

• Non/Less discriminatory employers
• Hire more qualified employees for less
• What happens as more of them enter?
• Wage of blondes driven up
• Perfect competition eliminates discrimination

9
Application to Sports

• What of 1964 Alabama football team?
• Very good and very white
• But Bama started losing to integrated teams
• Sam Bam Cunningham of USC scores 5 TDs against
  them on national TV
• Cost became too great
• Sports became most integrated part of UA
• Bob Gibson and his (black) landlady
• Spring housing segregated in early 1960s
• Hated her for charging high rent
• Why does discrimination persist?

10
Monopoly Power

• Baseball has legal cartel
• Policed by commissioner
• Teams tried to cheat Cubans Indians
• Bill Veeck foiled in 1943
• Jackie Robinson reintegrated baseball
• Moses Fleetwood Walker in A.A. in 1880s
• Integrated teams tended to dominate
• Dodgers, Giants, Indians, Braves
• Red Sox Phillies last to integrate
• Great Celtic teams built on integration

11
Employee Discrimination

• Workers dont like to work with blondes
• Feel psychic cost w (1-d)w0
• Demand higher pay to work with blondes
• What would employer do?
• Segregation vs Discrimination
• Dodgers protested Robinsons presence
• Got Al Gionfriddo partly to take next locker

12
Customer Discrimination

• Separates discrimination from prejudice
• Employer punished for tolerance
• George Preston Marshall NFLs Redskins
• Last NFL team to integrate 1962
• Burgundy, Gold, and Caucasian
• Forced by U.S. government
• Facility on government land
• One key to intransigence Southern audience

13
Statistical Discrimination

• Also separates from prejudice
• Reminiscent of psychological approach
• May feel that blondes less productive
• Why different from saying dropouts worse?
• Flashy Frenchmen in the NHL
• Felt that Francophones not tough
• Europeans Flyers

14
bMeasuring Discrimination

• Motivating question
• How can blacks in NBA be victims when
• 80 of NBA black
• Make 20 more
• All else not equal
• How to hold all else equal?
• Key technique Multiple regression
• Sb0 b1X1 b2X2 bnXn e

15
Regression and Discrimination

• Coefficient impact of Xi with all other Xs
  constant
• Corresponds to economic definition of
  discrimination
• Holds all else equal
• What would Xs be for NBA?
• How to explain that blacks make more?
• True impact of race unclear

16
Sexual Discrimination

• Harder to measure
• Men Women seldom in same venue
• Often dont play same sport
• Even same sport may vary
• Tennis, figure skating, womens basketball
• Direct competition? Jockeys auto racing
• Women not always victims
• Gymnasts and figure skaters

17
Title IX

• Part of 1972 Education Amendments
• Mandated equal access opportunities for women
  in federally funded education programs
• 3 ways to comply
• Funding proportional to enrollment
• Show history of expansion
• Interests of students accommodated
• Few programs in compliance
• But NCAA certifies all

18
Impacts of Title IX

• Good
• Spurred rapid growth in womens sports
• Though most of growth early on
• Gave grounds to seek remediation (TU!)
• Bad
• What happened to women coaches?
• Was 80 of womens programs - now 44
• Womens programs lose money
• Can meet in many ways
• Cut mens programs rather than expanding womens

19
A Problem

• Bernie Williams
• Star player for Yankees
• What is he?
• Hometown San Juan
• How to classify?
• Ask player?
• Ask owner?
• Ask fans?

20
Puzzling Numbers From Track

• Asians 57 of worlds population
• Only impact in marathon
• Blacks 12 of worlds population
• 95 of best 100m times of West African ancestry
• 8 of worlds population
• All 32 finalists in last 4 Olympics
• North Africa dominates middle distance
• East Africa dominates distance

21
Astonishing Kenya

• More than half of top 100 5K 10K times
• Top 60 times in steeplechase
• Won every World Cross Country Championship since
  1986
• 38 Olympic track medals since 1964
• 13 golds in mens races
• Only U.S. (with 10X as many people) has more

22
More on Kenya

• 75 of Kenyas runners from Kalenjin
• Highlands near Lake Victoria
• 50 of these from Nandi district
• 1.8 of Kenyas population
• 20 of winners of major distance runs
• Not due to better facilities
• Other nations also have altitude

23
Discomfort with Genetics

• Intelligence as subtext
• Demeans accomplishments?
• Natural black v. hardworking white
• Demeans blacks in other fields?
• Naturally better in some areas
• gt worse in others?
• Some get brains others brawn

24
An Alternative Explanation

• Hoberman Darwins Athletes
• Blacks once considered ill-suited for athletics
• Analog to women?
• Opposite stereotype of today
• Considered physically fragile weak-willed
• Now see athletics the best route to success
• Survey More black youths optimistic about
  chances at athletics than in professions
• Only ethnic group to think so