Thread by @donmoyn

Lisa Cook's work documenting how a collapse in Black personal security dramatically undermined innovation is amazing. It speaks to the value that an empirical approach and different perspective provides a deeper understand of the economy. paulromer.net/lisa-cook/

What struck me looking that Cook's graph documenting a Reconstruction-era spike and Jim Crow era collapse in Black patents, is you see the same pattern in political participation (graph on the right documents voter registration in Louisiana, from Keele, Cubbison, and White, 2021)

This historical data had to be painstakingly assembled to provide a broader picture of US history. They speak to the enormous long-term costs of the abandonment of Reconstruction in terms of not just equality but human innovation and prosperity.

The Cook paper is here: link.springer.com/content/pdf/10…
The Keele et al paper is here: cambridge.org/core/journals/…