Do rental agents discriminate against minority customers? Evidence from the 2000 Housing Discrimination Study
Abstract This study examines the incidence and causes of housing discrimination in qualitative treatment by rental agents, using national audit data from the 2000 Housing Discrimination Study. Using the fixed-effects logit method described by [Review of Economic Studies 47(1) (1980) 225–238], we control for unobservable factors that are shared by audit teammates and conduct hypothesis tests for the incidence and causes of discrimination. We find evidence that rental housing discrimination has declined since 1989 but continues to exist in several important types of housing agent behavior. We also find evidence that this discrimination is caused by agents’ own prejudice and by their response to the prejudice of white clients.
A disaggregate specification for job search location choice is developed based on a binary logit structure. The proposed model includes a set of economic and a set of transportation level-of-service variables and can be used for implementing transportation and economic policies to improve service-area economic development. Transportation and Socioeconomic data from four Minnesota towns-Cloquet, LeSueur, Austin, and Albert Lea--are used for model testing and validation. The proposed specification predicts job search destination choice correctly up to 77 percent. Despite substantial differences across test town pairs, parameter statistical significance generally increases with sample size and model predictive power is not strongly influenced by location of application. Travel conditions for the period of expected employment are found to play a role in determining location choice. For all communities studied, expected length of employment is the strongest determinant of choice.