Race and Gender in the US Economy: How Markets and Constitutional Law Shape Economic Status

Race and Gender in the US Economy is the first economic and legal analysis of the status of women and Asian, Black, and Latinx Americans in the United States. Gerald Jaynes argues that changing antidiscrimination laws had an undervalued impact on behavioral norms as Americans fought to end discrimination in the country’s institutions. These fights often happened outside the economic marketplace and yet improved the economic status of people of color and women.

Building on his decades of exp...