02 Aug 2020Working Paper Summaries

Discrimination, Disenfranchisement and African American WWII Military Enlistment

by Nancy Qian and Marco Tabellini

The United States entered World War II during one of the worst periods of racial discrimination in post-Civil War history. This paper examines the social costs of this discrimination, with clear implications for policymakers: Requiring equal contributions from citizens means treating citizens equally.

Author Abstract

This paper documents that disenfranchisement and discrimination discouraged WWII volunteer military participation of African American men, relative to Caucasian men, after the Pearl Harbor attack. The race-gap in volunteer enlistment is most pronounced in regions where discrimination was particularly severe. There is no gap in draft enlistment anywhere. Consistent with the notion that disenfranchisement and discrimination discourage military participation, we document that forcibly interred Japanese Americans were much less likely to serve in the U.S. military than those not interred.