Race effects on eBay

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Ayres, Ian; Banaji, Mahzarin; Jolls, Christine
• 署名单位: Yale University; National Bureau of Economic Research; Harvard University
• 刊物名称: RAND JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0741-6261
• DOI: 10.1111/1756-2171.12115
• 发表日期: 2015
• 页码: 891-917
• 关键词: internet auctions; racial-discrimination; field experiment; reputation evidence; reserve prices; MARKET; rules; INFORMATION; insights

摘要

We investigate the impact of seller race in a field experiment involving baseball card auctions on eBay. Photographs showed the cards held by either a dark-skinned/African-American hand or a light-skinned/Caucasian hand. Cards held by African-American sellers sold for approximately 20% ($0.90) less than cards held by Caucasian sellers. Our evidence of race differentials is important because the online environment is well controlled (with the absence of confounding tester effects) and because the results show that race effects can persist in a thick real-world market such as eBay.