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Why Beauty Matters

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Author Info
Markus M. Mobius
Tanya S. Rosenblat

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Abstract

We decompose the beauty premium in an experimental labor market where "employers" determine wages of "workers" who perform a maze-solving task. This task requires a true skill which we show to be unaffected by physical attractiveness. We find a sizable beauty premium and can identify three transmission channels: (a) physically attractive workers are more confident and higher confidence increases wages; (b) for a given level of confidence, physically attractive workers are (wrongly) considered more able by employers; (c) controlling for worker confidence, physically attractive workers have oral skills (such as communication and social skills) that raise their wages when they interact with employers. Our methodology can be adopted to study the sources of discriminatory pay differentials in other settings.

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File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1257/000282806776157515
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File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/articles/article_detail.php?journal=AER&volume=96&issue=1&article=11&issue_date=March2006
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Publisher Info
Article provided by American Economic Association in its journal American Economic Review.

Volume (Year): 96 (2006)
Issue (Month): 1 (March)
Pages: 222-235
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Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:96:y:2006:i:1:p:222-235

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

  1. Claudia Goldin & Cecilia Rouse, 2000. "Orchestrating Impartiality: The Impact of "Blind" Auditions on Female Musicians," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 715-741, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Hamermesh, Daniel S & Biddle, Jeff E, 1994. "Beauty and the Labor Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(5), pages 1174-94, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Nicola Persico & Andrew Postlewaite & Dan Silverman, 2004. "The Effect of Adolescent Experience on Labor Market Outcomes: The Case of Height," NBER Working Papers 10522, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  4. Heckman, James J., 2000. "Policies to foster human capital," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 3-56, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  5. repec:att:wimass:192046 is not listed on IDEAS
  6. Biddle, Jeff E & Hamermesh, Daniel S, 1998. "Beauty, Productivity, and Discrimination: Lawyers' Looks and Lucre," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(1), pages 172-201, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  7. Heckman, James J, 1998. "Detecting Discrimination," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(2), pages 101-16, Spring. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Uri Gneezy & Muriel Niederle & Aldo Rustichini, 2003. "Performance In Competitive Environments: Gender Differences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 118(3), pages 1049-1074, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Neal, Derek A & Johnson, William R, 1996. "The Role of Premarket Factors in Black-White Wage Differences," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(5), pages 869-95, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Solnick, Sara J. & Schweitzer, Maurice E., 1999. "The Influence of Physical Attractiveness and Gender on Ultimatum Game Decisions," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 79(3), pages 199-215, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Sujoy Chakravarty & E. Somanathan, 2008. "Discrimination in an elite labour market? Job placements at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad," Indian Statistical Institute, Planning Unit, New Delhi Discussion Papers 08-01, Indian Statistical Institute, New Delhi, India. [Downloadable!]
  2. Belot, Michèle & Bhaskar, Venkataraman & Van de Ven, Jeroen, 2007. "Insidious Discrimination? Disentangling the Beauty Premium on a Game Show," CEPR Discussion Papers 6276, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Marianne Bertrand & Dean S. Karlan & Sendhil Mullainathan & Eldar Shafir & Jonathan Zinman, 2005. "What's Psychology Worth? A Field Experiment in the Consumer Credit Market," Working Papers 918, Economic Growth Center, Yale University. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  4. Roy Wada & Erdal Tekin, 2007. "Body Composition and Wages," NBER Working Papers 13595, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Olaf Hübler, 2006. "The Nonlinear Link between Height and Wages: An Empirical Investigation," IZA Discussion Papers 2394, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
  6. Kevin Denny, 2008. "Beauty and intelligence may or may not- be related," Working Papers 200802, Geary Institute, University College Dublin. [Downloadable!]
  7. Giam Pietro Cipriani & Angelo Zago, 2005. "Productivity or Discrimination? Beauty and the Exams," Working Papers 18, Università di Verona, Dipartimento di Scienze economiche. [Downloadable!]
  8. Niclas Berggren & Henrik Jordahl & Panu Poutvaara, 2006. "The Looks of a Winner: Beauty, Gender and Electoral Success," IZA Discussion Papers 2311, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  9. Máximo Torero & Marco Castillo & Ragan Petrie, 2008. "Ethnic and Social Barriers to Cooperation: Experiments Studying the Extent and Nature of Discrimination in Urban Peru," RES Working Papers 3246, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department. [Downloadable!]
  10. Steve DeLoach & Erika Lamanna, 2009. "Measuring the Impact of Microfinance on Child Health Outcomes in Indonesia," Working Papers 2009-02, Elon University, Department of Economics, revised 19 Jan 2009. [Downloadable!]
  11. Naci H. Mocan & Erdal Tekin, 2009. "Obesity, Self-esteem and Wages," NBER Working Papers 15101, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Ammermüller, Andreas, 2007. "Violence in European schools : victimization and consequences," ZEW Discussion Papers 07-004, ZEW - Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung / Center for European Economic Research. [Downloadable!]
  13. Michele Belot, & V. Bhaskar & Jeroen van de Ven, 2007. "Is Beauty only Skin-deep? Disentangling the Beauty Premium on a Game Show," Economics Discussion Papers 624, University of Essex, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  14. von Hinke Kessler Scholder, S, 2009. "*** Article withdrawn *** The Effect of Child Weight on Academic Performance: Evidence using Genetic Markers," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 09/25, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York. [Downloadable!]
  15. Sherry Glied & Matthew Neidell, 2008. "The Economic Value of Teeth," NBER Working Papers 13879, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Vincenzo Atella & Noemi Pace & Daniela Vuri, 2008. "Are employers discriminating with respect to weight? European Evidence using Quantile Regression," CEIS Research Paper 123, Tor Vergata University, CEIS, revised 14 Jul 2008. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  17. Craig Landry & Andreas Lange & John A. List & Michael K. Price & Nicholas G. Rupp, 2005. "Toward an Understanding of the Economics of Charity: Evidence from a Field Experiment," NBER Working Papers 11611, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  18. Catherine C. Eckel & Ragan Petrie, 2008. "Face Value," Experimental Economics Center Working Paper Series 2008-11, Experimental Economics Center, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University. [Downloadable!]
  19. Naci Mocan & Erdal Tekin, 2006. "Ugly Criminals," IZA Discussion Papers 2048, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  20. Daniel J. Benjamin & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2006. "Thin-Slice Forecasts of Gubernatorial Elections," NBER Working Papers 12660, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  21. Christian A. Gregory & Christopher J. Ruhm, 2009. "Where Does the Wage Penalty Bite?," NBER Working Papers 14984, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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This page was last updated on 2010-2-8.

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