Antecol, Heather, and Kelly Bedard. 2004. "The Racial Wage Gap: The Importance of Labor Force Attachment Differences across Black, Mexican, and White Men." Journal of Human Resources 39(2): 564-583.

Labor market attachment differs significantly across young black, Mexican, and white men. Although it has long been agreed that potential experience is a poor proxy for actual experience for women, many view it as an acceptable approximation for men. Using the NLSY, this paper documents the substantial difference between potential and actual experience for both black and Mexican men. We show that the fraction of the black/white and Mexican/white wage gaps that are explained by differences in potential experience are quite different from the fraction of the racial wage gaps that are explained by actual (real) experience differences.

Heather Antecol is an assistant professor of economics at Claremont McKenna College and Kelly Bedard is an assistant professor of economics at University of California--Santa Barbara. The data used in this article can be obtained beginning October 2004 through September 2007 from Lawrence M. Kahn, School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University, 264 from Heather Antecol, Department of Economics, Claremont McKenna College, 500 E. Ninth Street, Claremont, CA 91711.