Do economic downturns fuel racial animus? Articles uri icon

publication date

  • January 2020

start page

  • 9

end page

  • 18

volume

  • 175

abstract

  • We estimate the effect of economic conditions during the Great Recession on racial animus, as measured by Google searches for a commonly used anti-black racial slur and hate crimes against blacks. Our empirical strategy exploits pre-recession cross-state variation in the size of two economic sectors particularly affected by the Great Recession: manufacturing and real estate. We find that states that were dependent on these sectors were hit hardest by the Great Recession, experienced the largest increases in racist internet searches, and experienced the largest increases in hate crimes against blacks. © 2020 Elsevier B.V.

keywords

  • economic conditions google trends hate racial attitudes