Racial Discrimination in Major League Baseball: Is America's Pastime an Even Playing Field?

Abstract

This paper seeks to find if there is any prevalent discrimination within the labor market of Major League Baseball. Two sets of analysis are utilized: analysis on the effects that major awards have on different demographics as well as more general analysis regarding discrimination across the entirety of the labor market. Through the use of a difference-in-differences regression model, it is seen that non-white players benefit far more from winning major awards than their white peers. Further quantile regression analysis reveals significant discrimination against Latino players in both the 2000 and 2019 seasons, with no discrimination being present in the 1980 season. These findings are assumed to be a result of the nature of Latino players’ ascent to the Major Leagues. Many Latin-American players enroll in MLB organizations’ academies in early adolescence, thereby sacrificing their education and leaving themselves limited employment opportunities outside of the sport of baseball. This generates a demographic that is easily exploited within the labor market, resulting in the earnings discrepancies highlighted by my analysis.