IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/wpaper/halshs-00312794.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Price of Prejudice: Labour Market Discrimination on the Grounds of Gender and Ethnicity

Author

Listed:
  • Andrea Bassanini

    (ERMES - Equipe de recherche sur les marches, l'emploi et la simulation - UP2 - Université Panthéon-Assas - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, DELSA - OCDE - Organisation de Coopération et de Développement Economiques = Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development)

  • Anne Saint-Martin

    (DELSA - OCDE - Organisation de Coopération et de Développement Economiques = Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development)

Abstract

Despite some progress, there is still evidence of discrimination on the grounds of gender and ethnic or racial origins in OECD labour markets. Field experiments show pervasive ethnic discrimination in many countries. We show indirect cross-country/time-series evidence that, using product market regulation as an instrument, suggests that on average at least 8% of the gender employment gap and a larger proportion of the gender wage gap can be attributed to discrimination. Virtually all OECD countries have enacted anti-discrimination laws in recent decades, and evaluations as well as cross-country analysis suggest that, if well-designed, these laws can be effective in reducing disparities in labour market outcomes. However, enforcement of anti-discrimination legislation is essentially based on victims' willingness to claim their rights. Thus, public awareness of legal rules and their expected consequences (notably, victims' costs and benefits of lodging complaints) is a crucial element of an effective policy strategy to establish a culture of equal treatment. However, legal rules are likely to have more impact if the enforcement is not exclusively dependent on individuals. In this respect, specific agencies may play a key role.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrea Bassanini & Anne Saint-Martin, 2008. "The Price of Prejudice: Labour Market Discrimination on the Grounds of Gender and Ethnicity," Working Papers halshs-00312794, HAL.
  • Handle: RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-00312794
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00312794
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00312794/document
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Juan J. Dolado & Cecilia Garcia-Peñalosa & Sara de La Rica, 2013. "On Gender Gaps And Self-Fulfilling Expectations: Alternative Implications Of Paid-For Training," Post-Print hal-01499641, HAL.
    2. Valeria Maggian & Antonio Nicolò, 2016. "The wrong man for the job: biased beliefs and job mismatching," Post-Print halshs-01324733, HAL.
    3. Lieselotte Blommaert & Marcel Coenders & Frank Tubergen, 2014. "Ethnic Discrimination in Recruitment and Decision Makers’ Features: Evidence from Laboratory Experiment and Survey Data using a Student Sample," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 116(3), pages 731-754, May.
    4. Baert, Stijn & De Visschere, Sarah & Schoors, Koen & Vandenberghe, Désirée & Omey, Eddy, 2016. "First depressed, then discriminated against?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 247-254.
    5. Sara de la Rica & Juan José Dolado & Cecilia García-Peñalosa, 2008. "On gender gaps and self-fulfilling expectations: Theory, policies and some empirical evidence," Working Papers 2008-24, FEDEA.
    6. Sara Rica & Juan Dolado & Cecilia Garcia Peñalosa, 2012. "GINI DP 24: On gender gaps and self-fulfilling expectations: An alternative approach based on paid-for-training," GINI Discussion Papers 24, AIAS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies.
    7. Stijn Baert & Ann-Sophie De Pauw & Nick Deschacht, 2016. "Do Employer Preferences Contribute to Sticky Floors?," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 69(3), pages 714-736, May.
    8. Juan Camilo Cárdenas & Hugo Ñopo & Jorge Luis Castañeda, 2012. "Equidad en la Diferencia: Políticas para la Movilidad Social de Grupos de Identidad. Misión de Movilidad Social y Equidad," Documentos CEDE 10319, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    9. repec:aia:ginidp:dp24 is not listed on IDEAS

    More about this item

    Keywords

    field experiments; employment gaps; gender gaps; anti-discrimination laws;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-00312794. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.