Question

8. While little data exists for Free Blacks in the labor market during the 1800s, historian E. Horace Fitchett provides a 1940 study of free blacks in Charleston, South Carolina early in the eighteenth century that reveals some information about their labor market status. In 1859, Fitchett found the following: 353 Free Blacks paid taxes on property; 190 were slave holders and the property on which they paid taxes was assessed at $724,570 and the amount paid on slaves was S1,170. Assume the US wealth to income ratio was 45 percent in 1859 and average US income was $3,525. What does this imply about the ratio of black to white earnings/wages during this era? Demonstrate how this estimate can inform how long it would take for blacks to achieve earnings parity with whites in the US. What are the possible limitations of your estimates?