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  5. Labor Markets and Education: Papers in the Bill Spriggs Research and Policy Tradition
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Labor Markets and Education: Papers in the Bill Spriggs Research and Policy Tradition

Paper Session

Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026 10:15 AM - 12:15 PM (EST)

Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, Room 405
Hosted By: Labor and Employment Relations Association
  • Chair: Jesse Rothstein, University of California-Berkeley

Returns to Black Skill Acquisition Through the Lens of the Buffalo Soldiers

Omari Swinton
,
Howard University
Eddie Gray
,
Hampton University
Andria Smythe
,
Howard University

Abstract

The 325th Field Signal Battalion, an all-Black unit, were specifically trained to build and maintain telegraphic, telephonic, and wireless radio networks in the battlefields of World War I France. With their training in this nascent technology, it could be expected that many of these soldiers would find work (and potential wealth) in the growing telecommunications and radio industry after their military service. However, the racial climate of the period proved detrimental to this prospect. Our project seeks to understand the extent to which this climate may have hindered the labor market participation of these soldiers (within the telecommunications and radio industry) and constrained potential wealth accumulation. Considering contemporary conversations regarding merit and its benefits, the outcomes of the 325th Field Signal Battalion allow for empirical and anecdotal understanding of what determines merit and how much benefit it should accrue to its holders.
To this end, we build a dataset capturing the military training, educational attainment, and occupational outcomes of the soldiers of the 325th using archival military personnel and unit records, military pension claim records, and census records. As this project is ongoing, this paper details the method by which the data is compiled.

Did the Pandemic Spur the Creation of Jobs in the Transportation and Warehousing Sector that Benefitted Black Workers without College Degrees in the U.S.?

Michelle Holder
,
City University of New York

Abstract

The economic recovery in the United States after the onslaught of the COVID pandemic included considerable job growth in the transportation and warehousing industrial sector: this sector gained 838,000 jobs on an annualized basis from 2019 to 2023, accounting for nearly one in four jobs added after the economy regained the total number of jobs lost during the pandemic. While the U.S. economy experienced strong job growth through 2024, the industrial mix of jobs changed after 2019; the number of jobs in transportation and warehousing grow by 11 percent from 2019 to 2023, while employment in sectors such as leisure and hospitality and retail sales remained below their pre-pandemic levels during the same time period. Given employment growth in transportation and warehousing, as well as the representation of Black workers in this sector, this research seeks to address the following three questions: (1) did the pandemic spur the creation of jobs in the transportation and warehousing sector jobs that benefitted Black workers, particularly those who don’t possess a college degree?; (2) did Black women benefit from this sector’s job growth, and, if not, why not; (3) were the jobs being created in transportation and warehousing “good” jobs, defined in this research as offering compensation that wasn’t predominantly low-wage, as well as providing health insurance benefits, fair working conditions and full-time employment?

Desegregation and Military Installations: Does Military Presence Influence School Racial Composition?

Chantal Smith
,
Washington and Lee University

Abstract

In 1948, President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 9981 calling for complete integration of the military and creating the President’s Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Forces. Not until President Eisenhower’s administration, however, did Black military families and local civil rights organizations begin to address the issue of military children attending segregated schools. Education falls under states’ jurisdiction, so the schools serving military students were the responsibility of local education agencies and subject to state practices, including segregation. Using language found in Public Laws 815 and 874, US Commissioner of Education Earl J. McGrath created what were termed “Section 6 schools”—schools on military installations expressly serving military-connected children residing on federal property. These schools were often the first integrated schools in their states. I use contemporary measures of segregation to determine whether the presence of a local military installation affects the racial composition of school districts in the American South today. Previewing the results, I find that a military presence in a community is significantly correlated—albeit in opposite directions—with indices measuring both schools’ Black–white dissimilarity and Black students’ exposure to white students. Taken together, my results show that military presence is inversely correlated with segregation in local education agencies. This paper adds to our understanding of the forces that contributed to school desegregation in the American South.

Safety for Whom? How Law Enforcement and School Resource Officer Training Impacts Racial Gaps in School Exclusionary Discipline

Monique Davis
,
W. E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research

Abstract

Do race-neutral school safety policies have race-neutral impacts? In this paper, I present novel findings on the effects of statewide law enforcement credential and special training requirements for school resource officers (SROs) on Black-White gaps in suspensions, expulsions, law enforcement referrals, and school-related arrests (i.e., school exclusion). I answer these questions using data from the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights' 2013-14 through 2020-21 Civil Rights Data Collection school-level surveys and supplementary sources. The study leverages state and time variation in adopting SRO credential and training statutes between 2014-15 and 2020-21. The analysis compares Black-White school exclusion gaps in majority and minority Black middle and high schools with SROs between treated and untreated schools. I estimate average treatment effects on the treated using an advanced difference-in-difference method, clustered by state. The results indicate that requiring SROs to hold sworn law enforcement credentials more than doubles racial gaps in suspensions and law enforcement referrals in majority Black schools but not in minority Black schools and that SRO training policies have no significant relationship with racial school exclusion gaps. I then evaluate whether racial differences in school exclusion outcomes result from individual behaviors and cultural norms or structural factors like systemic discrimination—the first study to assess whether individualist or structuralist explanations underlying the relationship between SROs and racial disparities in school discipline better explain the findings. The findings suggest the need for structural, race-conscious policy changes to address racial disparities in school discipline.

Discussant(s)
Bryan Stuart
,
Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Bradley L. Hardy
,
Georgetown University
Abigail Wozniak
,
Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
Bocar Ba
,
Duke University
JEL Classifications
  • J0 - General