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April 1995

Relative earning of black men to white men by region, industry

Lisa Saunders

The earnings gap between black men and white men widened over the 1979-89 period; changes in workers' shares by industry had a noteworthy impact on earnings. This article examines whether a shift in the distribution of black men and white men across regions could have significantly contributed to widening the earnings gap between the two groups, or whether within-region shifts in industry employment and earnings contributed to the earnings divergence.

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