The declining significance of race among American men during the latter half of the twentieth century

The extent to which racial minority groups face discrimination in the labor market is the subject of considerable debate. Using William J. Wilson's th esis of the declining significance of race as our theoretical context, we p rovide further empirical evidence about labor market discrimination by inve stigating wages among African American, American Indian, Chinese American, Hispanic white, Japanese American, and non-Hispanic white men. We find, dur ing the period before the civil rights movement, that a substantively signi ficant wage disadvantage is evident for these minority groups with controls for observed labor force characteristics. In recent data, these net disadv antages are reduced substantially for each of these groups except Hispanics . With the exception of Hispanics, the results support Wilson's thesis.