Consumer racial discrimination: A reassessment of the market for baseball cards

Research on the presence of consumer racial discrimination in the baseball labor and memorabilia markets has produced contradictory empirical results. While studies of baseball salaries find no evidence of discrimination, Nardinelli and Simon (1990) and Andersen and La Croix (1991) use data from the baseball card market to show that the price that consumers pay for a card depends on the player’s race. In this paper, we reconsider the evidence of consumer discrimination in the baseball card market. Our study improves on previous research by applying more appropriate econometric methods and using a data set in which card supply is constant and incentives for speculative demand are weaker. In contradiction to the aforementioned studies, we find little evidence of racial discrimination. This result proves robust across variable specifications and econometric models. The authors thank Tyler Cowen, Kevin Grier, David Levy, Barb McKiernan, Don Palmer, Dan Sutler, and Bob Tollison for helpful suggestions on an earlier draft.