Age discrimination, apprenticeship training and hiring: Evidence from a scenario experiment

Axana Dalle, Toon Wybo, Stijn Baert and Dieter Verhaest

Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium from Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration

Abstract: In many countries, age discrimination appears to be driven by negative perceptions that recruiters stereotypically hold about older candidates’ technological skills, trainability, and flexibility. Based on human capital, signalling, and screening theories, we hypothesise that training programmes might both compensate for and mitigate these ageist stereotypes and thereby improve these candidates’ hiring chances. We test this pathway out of age discrimination by designing a scenario experiment in which professional recruiters assess the recruitability and human capital perceptions of fictitious candidates varying in age and (willingsness for) participation in apprenticeship training at older ages. Our results demonstrate that candidates indicating their (willingness for) participation in such training to obtain relevant work experience are more likely to be recruited than candidates without such experience, regardless of their age. Although apprenticeship training can compensate for age discrimination, it cannot mitigate this as the premium it yields is not higher for older workers.

Keywords: Hiring discrimination; Older workers; Labour market programmes; Apprenticeships; Signalling; Scenario experiment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J14 J24 J71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 56 pages
Date: 2024-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age and nep-lma
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Related works:
Working Paper: Age Discrimination, Apprenticeship Training and Hiring: Evidence from a Scenario Experiment (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:rug:rugwps:24/1092

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