Labor Market Discrimination in Lima, Peru: Evidence from a Field Experiment

Francisco Galarza () and Gustavo Yamada

World Development, 2014, vol. 58, issue C, 83-94

Abstract: We analyze labor discrimination in Peru, a fast-growing country where much anecdotal evidence suggests the presence of discriminatory practices in everyday life. Using surnames (indigenous/white) as a proxy for race, we sent 4820 fictitious CVs in response to 1205 real job vacancies for professional, technical, and unskilled jobs in Lima. Overall, whites receive more callbacks than indigenous applicants, and beautiful applicants receive more callbacks than homely-looking ones. The magnitude and significance of the racial and beauty gaps in callbacks substantially vary by job category. In particular, better looks only seem to matter in getting more callbacks for professional jobs.

Keywords: labor discrimination; field experiment; audit study; Peru; Latin America (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (34)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X14000047
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
Working Paper: Labor market discrimination in Lima, Peru: evidence from a field experiment (2012)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:58:y:2014:i:c:p:83-94

DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.01.003

Access Statistics for this article

World Development is currently edited by O. T. Coomes

More articles in World Development from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().