Affirmative Action and Human Capital Investment: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment

Christopher Cotton, Brent R. Hickman and Joseph P. Price

Journal of Labor Economics, 2022, vol. 40, issue 1, 157 - 185

Abstract: We conduct a field experiment paying students according to relative performance on a mathematics exam and tracking study efforts on a mathematics website to test the incentive effects of affirmative action (AA) policies on study effort and math proficiency. AA increases study effort and exam performance for the majority of disadvantaged students targeted by the policy. While the performance of the highest-ability students targeted by the AA policy declines, on average study activity and exam performance rise under AA. Overall, the experimental evidence suggests that AA can promote greater equality of market outcomes while narrowing achievement gaps.

Date: 2022
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/713743 (application/pdf)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/713743 (text/html)
Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

Related works:
Working Paper: Affirmative Action and Human Capital Investment: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment (2014)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucp:jlabec:doi:10.1086/713743

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Labor Economics from University of Chicago Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journals Division ().