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Beauty, Job Tasks, and Wages: A New Conclusion About Employer Taste-Based Discrimination

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Abstract

We use novel data to show that the beauty wage premium exists only in jobs where attractiveness is plausibly a productive characteristic. A large premium exists in jobs that require substantial amounts of interpersonal interaction, but no such premium exists in jobs that require working with information and data. This is inconsistent with employer taste-based discrimination, which would favor attractive workers in all jobs. Our unique task data address concerns that measurement error in the importance of interpersonal tasks may bias results towards employer discrimination. Our conclusions are in stark contrast to all previous research that uses a similar approach.

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  • Todd Stinebrickner & Ralph Stinebrickner & Paul Sullivan, 2017. "Beauty, Job Tasks, and Wages: A New Conclusion About Employer Taste-Based Discrimination," University of Western Ontario, Centre for Human Capital and Productivity (CHCP) Working Papers 20175, University of Western Ontario, Centre for Human Capital and Productivity (CHCP).
    • Handle: RePEc:uwo:hcuwoc:20175
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    1. Thesis Thursday: Luke Wilson
      by Chris Sampson in The Academic Health Economists' Blog on 2019-10-17 06:00:57

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    Cited by:

    1. Green, Colin P. & Wilson, Luke B. & Zhang, Anwen, 2023. "Beauty, underage drinking, and adolescent risky behaviours," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 215(C), pages 153-166.
    2. Ralph Stinebrickner & Todd Stinebrickner & Paul Sullivan, 2019. "Job Tasks, Time Allocation, and Wages," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(2), pages 399-433.
    3. Guodong Guo & Brad R. Humphreys & Qiangchang Wang & Yang Zhou, 2023. "Attractive or Aggressive? A Face Recognition and Machine Learning Approach for Estimating Returns to Visual Appearance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 24(6), pages 737-758, August.
    4. Nikitina, N. & Bolgova, V. & Vinopal, M. & Nikiforova, T., 2022. "The influence of external attractiveness on the transfer value of football players," Journal of the New Economic Association, New Economic Association, vol. 54(2), pages 176-187.
    5. Zhang, Junsen & Fei, Shulan & Wen, Yanbing, 2023. "How Does the Beauty of Wives Affect Post-marriage Family Outcomes? Helen's Face in Chinese Households," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 212(C), pages 122-137.
    6. Storm, Eduard, 2023. "Skill mismatch and learning-by-doing: Theory and evidence from time allocation on tasks," Ruhr Economic Papers 1021, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    7. Zhang, Junsen & Fei, Shulan & Wen, Yanbing, 2023. "How Does the Beauty of Wives Affect Post-Marriage Family Outcomes? Helen's Face in Chinese Households," IZA Discussion Papers 16157, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Zeyang Chen & Yu-Jane Liu & Juanjuan Meng & Zeng Wang, 2023. "What’s in a Face? An Experiment on Facial Information and Loan-Approval Decision," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(4), pages 2263-2283, April.
    9. Colin Green & Luke Wilson & Anwen Zhang, 2019. "Beauty and Adolescent Risky Behaviours," Working Paper Series 18019, Department of Economics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology.
    10. Andrea Fazio, 2021. "Beautiful inequality: Are beautiful people more willing to redistribute?," Working Papers in Public Economics 194, University of Rome La Sapienza, Department of Economics and Law.
    11. Dilmaghani, Maryam, 2020. "Beauty perks: Physical appearance, earnings, and fringe benefits," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 38(C).
    12. Mehic, Adrian, 2022. "Student beauty and grades under in-person and remote teaching," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 219(C).
    13. Gründler, Klaus & Potrafke, Niklas & Wochner, Timo, 2024. "The beauty premium of politicians in office," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 217(C), pages 298-311.
    14. Jason Sockin, 2022. "Show Me the Amenity: Are Higher-Paying Firms Better All Around?," CESifo Working Paper Series 9842, CESifo.
    15. David Ong, 2022. "The college admissions contribution to the labor market beauty premium," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 40(3), pages 491-512, July.
    16. Fazio, Andrea, 2022. "Attractiveness and preferences for redistribution," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 46(C).
    17. Huang, Xing & Ivković, Zoran & Jiang, John Xuefeng & Wang, Isabel Yanyan, 2023. "Angel investment and first impressions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 149(2), pages 161-178.
    18. Peng, Langchuan & Wang, Xi & Ying, Shanshan, 2020. "The heterogeneity of beauty premium in China: Evidence from CFPS," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 386-396.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J7 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination

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