The Role of Information in Deterring Discrimination: A New Experimental Evidence of Statistical Discrimination

David Masclet (), Emmanuel Peterle () and Sophie Larribeau ()

Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes & University of Caen) from Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes, University of Caen and CNRS

Abstract: This paper investigates experimentally gender and race discrimination in hiring decisions through a simple controlled setting where employers can observe workers’ individual characteristics before recruiting them. In this paper, we explore whether discrimination, if any, is statistical or taste-based. For this purpose, we varied across our treatments the level of information available to the employer during the hiring stage regarding workers’ potential ability. When no relevant information on ability is provided, we observe both significant gender and race discrimination. The introduction of information on ability or competitiveness reduces discrimination significantly, suggesting that discrimination is mainly due to a lack of information rather than preferences. Our findings indicate however that the reduction in discrimination strongly depends on the nature of the additional information available.

Keywords: real effort experiment; statistical discrimination; taste based discrimination; performance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C90 C92 J15 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem, nep-exp and nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tut:cremwp:201238

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