The Kerner Commission Report: Did It Incentivize or Cause an Increase in the Production and Hiring of Black PhD Economists in Academia?

Abstract

Approximately 50 years ago, the Kerner Commission Report cited pervasive racial discrimination in training, education, and employment as a contributor to Black–White inequality and stratification in the United States. This article considers if the Kerner Commission Report incentivized and possibly caused an increase in the production and hiring of Black PhD economists in academia. With longitudinal data on counts of economic doctorates earned by Black Americans employed in economics departments between 1957 and 2018, we estimate the parameters of count data specifications that accounts for the 1968 Kerner Commission Report dichotomously. Parameter estimates from mixed and fixed effect Poisson, negative binomial, and Poisson quantile specifications suggest that while the Kerner Commission Report generally had a positive effect on the number of Black American economics doctorates employed as faculty, it had no effect on the hiring of Black economists at the typical research institution and PhD-granting economics department. Our results suggest that similar to the Kerner Commission Report characterization of the United States being two separate racially stratified societies, approximately 50 years later research institutions and PhD-granting economics departments in the United States are similarly racially stratified.