The Effects of Affirmative Action Bans on College Enrollment, Educational Attainment, and the Demographic Composition of Universities

2010/12/08 by Peter Hinrichs · 2 citations
Social Sciences · #Higher Education Research Studies #School Choice and Performance #Race, History, and American Society

paper · doi:10.1162/rest_a_00170

openalex publication_date 2010/12/08 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/12

Abstract

I estimate the effects of affirmative action bans on college enrollment, educational attainment, and college demographic composition by exploiting time and state variation in bans. I find that bans have no effect on the typical student and the typical college, but they decrease underrepresented minority enrollment and increase white enrollment at selective colleges. In addition, I use the case study methods of Abadie and Gardeazabal (2003) and Abadie, Diamond, and Hainmueller (2010) and find that the affirmative action ban in California shifted underrepresented minority students from more selective campuses to less selective ones at the University of California.

Citations

• Affirmative Action and Its Alternatives in Public Universities: What Do We Know?
• Synthetic Control Methods for Comparative Case Studies: Estimating the Effect of California’s Tobacco Control Program

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