Job Market Discrimination against Slum Dwellers in Urban Argentina

Wladimir Zanoni, Paloma Acevedo and Hugo Hernández

No 12122, IDB Publications (Working Papers) from Inter-American Development Bank

Abstract: We conducted a paired correspondence experiment in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to measure the extent of labor market discrimination in hiring against slum dwellers. We sent 4,290 online pairs of fictitious job applications of otherwise observationally equivalent individuals who differed in a single attribute: place of residence, either a slum or not. We found that job applicants living in slums received nearly 28 percent fewer callbacks than other applicants. We observe discrimination across jobs that require a university degree, with discrimination being concentrated in administrative and software-related occupations. We observed discrimination against both men and women living in slums. Discrimination also varied by occupation. Discrimination against slum dwellers is an invisible barrier that affects their employment probability, ultimately reducing their likelihood of graduating from poverty.

Keywords: Correspondence study; discrimination (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J15 J71 J78 O10 O18 O54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:idb:brikps:12122

DOI: 10.18235/0004179

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