Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/250627 
Year of Publication: 
2021
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 14966
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Notwithstanding the improved integration of various minority groups in the workforce, unequal treatment in hiring still hinders many individuals' access to the labour market. To tackle this inaccessibility, it is essential to know which and to what extent minority groups face hiring discrimination. This meta-analysis synthesises a quasi-exhaustive register of correspondence experiments on hiring discrimination published between 2005 and 2020. Using a random-effects model, we computed pooled discrimination ratios concerning ten discrimination grounds upon which unequal treatment in hiring is forbidden under United States federal or state law. Our meta-analysis shows that hiring discrimination against candidates with disabilities, older candidates, and less physically attractive candidates is at least equally severe as the unequal treatment of candidates with salient ethnic characteristics. Remarkably, hiring discrimination against older applicants is even more outspoken in Europe than in the United States. Furthermore, unequal treatment in hiring based on sexual orientation seems to be prompted mainly by signalling activism rather than same-sex orientation in itself. Last, aside from a significant decrease in ethnic hiring discrimination in Europe, we find no structural evidence of recent temporal changes in hiring discrimination based on the various other grounds within the scope of this review.
Subjects: 
hiring discrimination
unequal treatment
meta-analysis
correspondence experiment
audit study
JEL: 
J71
J23
J14
J15
J16
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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