Racial Identity, Reactions to Inequality, and Fairness Concepts among Americans
23 Pages Posted: 13 Feb 2024 Last revised: 4 Nov 2024
Date Written: November 03, 2024
Abstract
How do Americans react to perceptions of racial inequality? We subtly introduce economic inequality in an experiment between groups of Black and White Americans while varying whether inequality occurs by chance or is the result of human agency. Subjects are given the ability to correct that inequality by taking actions that are sometimes costly. All subjects are more likely to correct inequality if their racial ingroup is disadvantaged. Black subjects react more strongly when inequality is man-made, whereas the source of inequality does not matter to Whites. When they perceive their ingroup as being treated unfairly, Black subjects are willing to accept greater material costs to correct inequality than White subjects. Subjects’ concept of fairness switches depending on whether their ingroup or outgroup is disadvantaged: they become more likely to behave unfairly themselves to correct inequality against others if the outgroup benefits at the expense of the ingroup.
Keywords: Discrimination, Identity, Racial Bias, Social Norms, Threat
JEL Classification: B41, D01, D9
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation