the 20th-century one-drop rule made it relatively difficult for anyone of known black ancestry to be accepted as white. the child of an african-american sharecropper and a white person was considered black by the local communities. in terms of the economics of sharecropping, such a person also would likely become a sharecropper as well, thus adding to the landholder or employer's labor force. in short, this theory suggests that in a 20th-century economy that benefited from sharecropping, it was useful to have as many blacks as possible.