TY - JOUR
T1 - Can immigrants counteract employer discrimination? A factorial field experiment reveals the immutability of ethnic hierarchies
AU - Vernby, Kåre
AU - Dancygier, Rafaela
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Vernby, Dancygier. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2019/7/1
Y1 - 2019/7/1
N2 - How pervasive is labor market discrimination against immigrants and what options do policymakers and migrants have to reduce it? To answer these questions, we conducted a field experiment on employer discrimination in Sweden. Going beyond existing work, we test for a large range of applicant characteristics using a factorial design. We examine whether migrants can affect their employment chances—by adopting citizenship, acquiring work experience, or signaling religious practice—or whether fixed traits such as country of birth or gender are more consequential. We find little systematic evidence that immigrants can do much to reduce discrimination. Rather, ethnic hierarchies are critical: callback rates decline precipitously with the degree of ethno-cultural distance, leaving Iraqis and Somalis, especially if they are male, with much reduced employment chances. These findings highlight that immigrants have few tools at their disposal to escape ethnic penalties and that efforts to reduce discrimination must address employer prejudice.
AB - How pervasive is labor market discrimination against immigrants and what options do policymakers and migrants have to reduce it? To answer these questions, we conducted a field experiment on employer discrimination in Sweden. Going beyond existing work, we test for a large range of applicant characteristics using a factorial design. We examine whether migrants can affect their employment chances—by adopting citizenship, acquiring work experience, or signaling religious practice—or whether fixed traits such as country of birth or gender are more consequential. We find little systematic evidence that immigrants can do much to reduce discrimination. Rather, ethnic hierarchies are critical: callback rates decline precipitously with the degree of ethno-cultural distance, leaving Iraqis and Somalis, especially if they are male, with much reduced employment chances. These findings highlight that immigrants have few tools at their disposal to escape ethnic penalties and that efforts to reduce discrimination must address employer prejudice.
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U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0218044
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0218044
M3 - Article
C2 - 31339894
AN - SCOPUS:85069747579
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 14
JO - PloS one
JF - PloS one
IS - 7
M1 - e0218044
ER -