Working Paper: NBER ID: w20361
Authors: Danny Yagan
Abstract: Affirmative action bans can reduce black enrollment not only by reducing black admission advantages (contracting demand) but also by reducing applications (contracting supply) from black students who can still gain admission but prefer alternative schools that still practice affirmative action. When affirmative action was banned at UC law schools, Berkeley's black applications and enrollment declined by almost half even as black admission rates rose relative to whites. I ask whether black enrollment at UC law schools would have markedly declined even without the supply contraction. I find in a large sample of students applying to law schools nationwide that black supply contractions were driven mostly or entirely by students unlikely to gain admission under the ban, yielding stronger post-ban black applicant pools. Holding applicant pools constant, I estimate that the ban reduced black admission rates at both Berkeley and UCLA by half. Hence, black enrollment at these elite schools would likely have plummeted even if supply contractions had been muted---as could occur under a nationwide ban that eliminates affirmative-action-practicing alternatives.
Keywords: affirmative action; law school admissions; black enrollment; supply and demand
JEL Codes: I0; J0; K0
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Affirmative action ban (J78) | Black admission rates at UC Berkeley and UCLA (I24) |
| Affirmative action ban (J78) | Opportunity costs for admitting black students (I24) |
| Affirmative action ban (J78) | Contraction in demand for black students (J79) |
| Contraction in demand for black students (J79) | Reduced admission advantages for black applicants (I24) |
| Affirmative action ban (J78) | Decline in applications from less-credentialed black students (I24) |
| Decline in applications from less-credentialed black students (I24) | Stronger applicant pool for black students (I24) |
| Affirmative action ban (J78) | Black enrollment (I24) |