Voting Rights and the Resilience of Black Turnout, 2022
Economic Inquiry
Abstract: The Voting Rights Act of 1965 increased turnout among Black voters, which then generated economic benefits for Black communities. In Shelby County v. Holder (2013), the Supreme Court invalidated the enforcement mechanism responsible for these improvements, prompting concerns that states with histories of discriminatory election practices would respond by suppressing Black turnout. I estimate the effect of the Shelby decision on the racial composition of the electorate using triple-difference comparisons of validated turnout data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study. The data suggest that the Shelby decision did not widen the Black-white turnout gap in states subject to the ruling.
Media coverage: CNN + The New York Times (1) + The New York Times (2)
Online Appendix
Does the Salience of Race Mitigate Gaps in Disciplinary Outcomes? Evidence from School Fights (with Glen Waddell)
Abstract: Racial gaps in the adjudication of student misconduct are well documented—for similar behaviors, students of color are more likely to be disciplined and discipline tends to be harsher. While students of color do receive harsher punishments, on average, we show that this differential depends on the racial composition of incidents. Consistent with administrators moving toward equal treatment when variation in race is more salient, multi-race incidents evidence no differentials in our data. In fact, when a white student is implicated in the same incident as a student of color, punishments imposed on students of color are indistinguishable from those imposed on white students in all-white incidents.
Race, Gender, and Second Chances: Do Employers Engage More with Some Candidates than with Others? (with Glen Waddell)
Losing Consensus: Does the Role of Juries Change in an Age of Political Polarization? (with Glen Waddell)
Getting the Hard Ones Right: How Relative Performance Feedback on Specific Questions Affects Student Performance (with Glen Waddell)