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Booth, Leigh, and Varganova on Racial & Ethnic Discrimination in Australia

By Lawrence Solum

Alison L. Booth, Andrew Leigh and Elena Varganova (Australian National University - Research School of Social Sciences (RSSS) , University of Essex - Department of Economics , Australian National University - Economics Program, Research School of Social Sciences and Australian National University) have posted Does Racial and Ethnic Discrimination Vary Across Minority Groups? Evidence from a Field Experiment on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

We conduct a large-scale audit discrimination study to measure labor market discrimination across different minority groups in Australia ? a country where one quarter of the population was born overseas. To denote ethnicity, we use distinctively Anglo-Saxon, Indigenous, Italian, Chinese, and Middle Eastern names, and our goal is a comparison across multiple ethnic groups rather than focusing on a single minority as in most other studies. In all cases, we applied for entry-level jobs and submitted a CV showing that the candidate had attended high school in Australia. We find economically and statistically significant differences in callback rates, suggesting that ethnic minority candidates would need to apply for more jobs in order to receive the same number of interviews. These differences vary systematically across groups, with Italians (a more established migrant group) suffering less discrimination than Chinese and Middle Easterners (who have typically arrived more recently). We also explore various explanations for our empirical findings.

Full post as published by Legal Theory Blog on December 15, 2009 (boomark / email).