Racial Discrimination in the Sharing Economy: Evidence from a Field Experiment

Benjamin Edelman, Michael Luca and Dan Svirsky

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 2017, vol. 9, issue 2, 1-22

Abstract: In an experiment on Airbnb, we find that applications from guests with distinctively African American names are 16 percent less likely to be accepted relative to identical guests with distinctively white names. Discrimination occurs among landlords of all sizes, including small landlords sharing the property and larger landlords with multiple properties. It is most pronounced among hosts who have never had an African American guest, suggesting only a subset of hosts discriminate. While rental markets have achieved significant reductions in discrimination in recent decades, our results suggest that Airbnb's current design choices facilitate discrimination and raise the possibility of erasing some of these civil rights gains.

JEL-codes: C93 J15 L83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
Note: DOI: 10.1257/app.20160213
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (180)

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