What Caused Racial Disparities in Particulate Exposure to Fall? New Evidence from the Clean Air Act and Satellite-Based Measures of Air Quality
- (pp. 71-97)
Abstract
This project links administrative census microdata to spatially continuous measures of particulate pollution (PM2.5) to first document and then decompose the key drivers of convergence in black-white pollution exposure differences. We use quantile regression to show that a significant portion of the convergence in Black-White exposure is attributable to differential impacts of the Clean Air Act (CAA) in Black and White communities. Areas with larger Black populations saw greater CAA-related declines in PM2.5. We show that the CAA can account for over 60 percent of the racial convergence in PM2.5 pollution exposure in the United States since 2000.Citation
Currie, Janet, John Voorheis, and Reed Walker. 2023. "What Caused Racial Disparities in Particulate Exposure to Fall? New Evidence from the Clean Air Act and Satellite-Based Measures of Air Quality." American Economic Review, 113 (1): 71-97. DOI: 10.1257/aer.20191957Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- J15 Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
- K32 Environmental, Energy, Health, and Safety Law
- Q51 Valuation of Environmental Effects
- Q53 Air Pollution; Water Pollution; Noise; Hazardous Waste; Solid Waste; Recycling
- Q58 Environmental Economics: Government Policy