Skin color, sex, and educational attainment in the post-civil rights era.

Highlights: [•] We model the relationship between color and educational attainment within sex and race. [•] We use the percent of light reflected off skin as a continuous measure of skin color. [•] Lightness is associated with higher attainment in US-born Black men and women. [•] Lightness is associated with higher attainment for White women, but not for White men. [•] Discrimination by skin color may be less specific to race than previously thought. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]