Abstract
This essay provides a streamlined presentation of stratification economics (SE) in three pillars and comments on Patrick L. Mason’s (2023) book The Economics of Structural Racism: Stratification Economics and US Labor Markets. SE, a field that seeks to understand racism and other social inequalities between ascriptive groups, is characterized by rational, self-interested models of group conflict, where social groups, not individuals, are the fundamental unit of analysis, and where intergenerational transmission of advantage or disadvantage cannot be overlooked. Mason demonstrates how, compared to the dominant alternatives in economics, SE better explains changes in racial inequality over time. (JEL D31, D63, D74, D91, J15, J71, N30)