Degrees of inequality: the advance of black male workers in the northern meat packing and steel industries before World War II

Recent major works on long-term racial inequality in the labor market revolve around competing hypotheses concerning the importance of human capital factors (Smith and Welch 1989) and government policy (Donohue and Heckman 1991) in promoting black advance. There is however, another line or thinking which emphasizes the importance of experimentation and "demand-side learning": employers' gaining access to accurate information about the abilities of black workers and adjusting their beliefs in accordance with this informoition.