About

Mackenzie Alston is an Assistant Professor of Finance at the Gies College of Business, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Texas A & M University and an A.B. in Economics and Mathematics from Washington University at Saint Louis. Her professional experience includes roles such as Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Lecturer of Finance at the University of Illinois, and Assistant Professor at Michigan State University. Her research focuses on economic behavior and social issues, with recent publications exploring topics such as racial and ethnic inclusion, perceptions of police bias, and discrimination in hiring. She has also contributed to understanding stereotypes' effects on test scores and charitable giving preferences. Alston is actively involved in research initiatives and has presented her work at various academic conferences.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Sociology
• Social psychology
• Gender studies
• Law
• Psychology

Selected publications

• Replication package accompanying “Leaving Money on the Table”

  Mendeley Data · 2026-02-04

  datasetOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  These data and accompanying code comprise what's necessary to reproduce the tables and figures in “Leaving Money on the Table” and its Online Appendix. All data are anonymized and contain no personally identifiable information. Only variables necessary for replication are provided.

  PublisherDOI

• Replication package accompanying “Leaving Money on the Table”

  Open MIND · 2026-02-04

  dataset1st authorCorresponding

  These data and accompanying code comprise what's necessary to reproduce the tables and figures in “Leaving Money on the Table” and its Online Appendix. All data are anonymized and contain no personally identifiable information. Only variables necessary for replication are provided.

  DOI

• Leaving Money on the Table

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Leaving Money on the Table

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Does black and blue matter? An experimental investigation of race, perceptions of police, and legal compliance

  Journal of Public Economics · 2025-08-08

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Using an online experiment, we examine the role of race in perceptions of policing and willingness to violate the law. Black and White subjects were asked to imagine themselves driving in a real (but unnamed) majority White or majority non-White US city in which the police department was either majority White or majority non-White. Subjects were incentivized to drive quickly but also warned that they might receive a ticket based on their speed, their personal characteristics, and the real-life ticketing practices in that city. Expectations about the likelihood of being ticketed for speeding were higher among Black subjects than among White subjects. Black subjects also showed a higher willingness to pay for information on the racial makeup of the police department. However, Black subjects drove at similar speeds under all conditions tested, regardless of the racial demographics of the city, the racial composition of the police department, or the disparity or congruence of the two. By contrast, White subjects drove faster when police departments were not racially representative. • Black drivers predicted a higher chance of receiving a speeding ticket. • Black drivers drover slower than White drivers in all contexts. • White drivers drove slower when in a city with a representative police force. • Black drivers’ speed did not depend on representativeness.

  PublisherDOI

• Leaving Money on the Table

  National Bureau of Economic Research · 2025-04-01

  reportOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  There is much disagreement about the extent to which financial incentives motivate study participants.We elicit preferences for being paid for completing a survey, including a one-intwenty chance of winning a $100 electronic gift card, a guaranteed electronic gift card with the same expected value, and an option to refuse payment.More than twice as many participants chose the lottery as chose the guaranteed payment.Given that most people are risk averse, this pattern suggests that factors beyond risk preferences-such as hassle costs-influenced their decisionmaking.Almost 20 percent of participants actively refused payment, demonstrating low monetary motivation.We find both systematic and unobserved heterogeneity in the characteristics of who turned down payment.The propensity to refuse payment is more than four times as large among individuals 50 and older compared to younger individuals, suggesting a tradeoff between financially motivating participants and obtaining a representative sample.Overall, our results suggest that modest electronic gift card payments violate key requirements of Vernon Smith's induced value theory.

  PublisherDOI

• Leaving Money on the Table

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Does Black and Blue Matter? An Experimental Investigation of Race, Perceptions of Police, and Legal Compliance

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2024-01-01

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Eliminating discrimination in hiring isn’t enough

  IZA World of Labor · 2023-01-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Eliminating discrimination in hiring isn't enoughFirms interested in workplace diversity should consider the posthiring stage and why some minority employees choose to leave

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Professional Visibility and Academic Careers

  AEA Randomized Controlled Trials · 2023-08-30

  dataset
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• David A. Jaeger

  14 shared

• Joan Llull

  Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

  11 shared

• Melanie Guldi

  10 shared

• Petra Thiemann

  Lund University

  9 shared

• Margherita Fort

  8 shared

• Deborah A. Cobb‐Clark

  ARC Centre of Excellence for Children and Families over the Life Course

  7 shared

• Joanna Lahey

  Texas A&M University

  7 shared

• Pilar Beneito

  Universitat de València

  7 shared

Awards & honors

• Police Recruitment and Officer Quality, J-PAL, 2026 to prese…