Does Employee Body Weight Affect Employers' Behavior?

Lene Kromann ()
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Lene Kromann: School of Economics and Management, University of Aarhus, Denmark, Postal: 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark

Economics Working Papers from Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University

Abstract: This paper offers a study of possible favoritism of normal-weight individuals when firms make decisions on hiring, firing and promoting. Most existing studies use a wage equation to document dispersion in wages between normal- and overweight, however little is known about the reason for dispersion. Furthermore, the wage equations do not capture the sorting of workers into different occupations and industries. Using an equilibrium search model, this paper takes search friction and cross-firm differences in factor productivity into account, when looking at firm behavior. Addition- ally, a logit model is used to examine the occupation and industry distribution. Most importantly, we find that wage differences between normal-weight and overweight or obese workers are explained by differential firm behavior, both with respect to the job offer arrival rate and to the probability of being promoted. Further, we find that the trade industry hire overweight workers to a lesser extent than other industries.

Keywords: Overweight; Firm behavior; Equilibrium Search Model; Multinomial Logit (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 27
Date: 2009-03-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec, nep-hea and nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aah:aarhec:2009-04

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