Personal Characteristics and Hiring Practices: Informational Aspects of Discrimination

Brian Chiplin and Peter Sloane

Chapter 5 in Sex Discrimination in the Labour Market, 1976, pp 73-88 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract In the light of the imperfections of some of the models discussed in the last chapter, and particularly dissatisfaction with taste-based theories, several writers have turned to the role of information in sustaining discrimination. Thus, Arrow1 suggests that employer discrimination can be thought of as reflecting perceptions of reality rather than tastes. If employers believe that women have lower productivity than men they will only hire them at a lower wage. Similarly Phelps2 has argued that an employer who seeks to maximise expected profits will be less willing to hire women if he believes them to be less qualified and more unreliable and to have a higher turnover than men on average, and if there are high costs of obtaining information about the characteristics of individuals. Thus an analysis of employer hiring practice is vital to an understanding of sex discrimination.

Keywords: Labour Market; Occupational Segregation; Internal Labour Market; Hiring Process; Tight Labour Market (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1976
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-1-349-02784-2_5

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DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-02784-2_5

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