%0 Report
        %A Anderson, D. Mark
%A Charles, Kerwin Kofi
%A Rees, Daniel I.
        %T The Federal Effort to Desegregate Southern Hospitals and the Black-White Infant Mortality Gap
        %D 2020
        %8 2020 Dec
        %I Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        %C Bonn
        %7 IZA Discussion Paper
        %N 13920
        %U https://www.iza.org/index.php/publications/dp13920
        %X In 1966, Southern hospitals were barred from participating in Medicare unless they discontinued their long-standing practice of racial segregation. Using data from five Deep South states and exploiting county-level variation in Medicare certification dates, we find that gaining access to an ostensibly integrated hospital had no effect on the Black-White infant mortality gap, although it may have discouraged small numbers of Black mothers from giving birth at home attended by a midwife. These results are consistent with descriptions of the federal hospital desegregation campaign as producing only cosmetic changes and illustrate the limits of anti-discrimination policies imposed upon reluctant actors.
        %K hospital desegregation
%K black infant mortality
%K Medicare
%K civil rights