Working Paper: NBER ID: w23421
Authors: David Arnold; Will Dobbie; Crystal S. Yang
Abstract: This paper develops a new test for identifying racial bias in the context of bail decisions – a high-stakes setting with large disparities between white and black defendants. We motivate our analysis using Becker's (1957) model of racial bias, which predicts that rates of pre-trial misconduct will be identical for marginal white and marginal black defendants if bail judges are racially unbiased. In contrast, marginal white defendants will have a higher probability of misconduct than marginal black defendants if bail judges are racially biased against blacks. To test the model, we develop a new estimator that uses the release tendencies of quasi-randomly assigned bail judges to identify the relevant race-specific misconduct rates. Estimates from Miami and Philadelphia show that bail judges are racially biased against black defendants, with substantially more racial bias among both inexperienced and part-time judges. We also find that both black and white judges are biased against black defendants. We argue that these results are consistent with bail judges making racially biased prediction errors, rather than being racially prejudiced per se.
Keywords: Racial Bias; Bail Decisions; Pretrial Misconduct
JEL Codes: J15; J71; K14
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| bail judges exhibit racial bias against black defendants (J15) | marginally released white defendants are 180 percentage points more likely to be rearrested prior to case disposition than marginally released black defendants (K14) |
| inexperienced and part-time judges show more significant racial bias (J15) | judges may be relying on race-based heuristics that exaggerate perceived risks associated with black defendants (K40) |
| racial bias persists across different crime types (K42) | bias is not merely a function of the types of crimes defendants are charged with (K40) |
| bail judges make racially biased prediction errors (J15) | judges demonstrate bias against black defendants (J71) |