Do Equal Employment Opportunity Statements Backfire? Evidence From A Natural Field Experiment On Job-Entry Decisions
by Andreas Leibbrandt, John A. List – #25035 (LE LS)
Labor force composition and the allocation of talent remain of
vital import to modern economies. For their part, governments
and companies around the globe have implemented equal employment
opportunity (EEO) regulations to influence labor market flows.
Even though such regulations are pervasive, surprisingly little
is known about their impacts. We use a natural field experiment
conducted across 10 U.S. cities to investigate if EEO statements
in job advertisements affect the first step in the employment
process, application rates. Making use of data from nearly 2,500
job seekers, we find considerable policy effects, but in an
unexpected direction: the presence of an EEO statement dampens
rather than encourages racial minorities’ willingness to apply
for jobs. Importantly, the effects are particularly pronounced
for educated job seekers and in cities with white majority
populations. Complementary survey evidence suggests the
underlying mechanism at work is “tokenism”, revealing that EEO
statements backfire because racial minorities avoid environments
in which they are perceived as regulatory, or symbolic, hires
rather than being hired on their own merits. Beyond their
practical and theoretical importance, our results highlight how
field experiments can significantly improve policymaking. In
this case, if one goal of EEO regulations is to enhance the pool
of minority applicants, then it is not working.
The background assumptions and reasons for the avowed policy are important. Very often discrimination against blacks and women were based on entrenched beliefs that they were less competent than whites or males. In that case the imp;llied messsacd may be: OK, we’ll take you, but you have to work harder than males of whites to prove yourself. “Jenny is ok. She thinks like a man”.
On the other hand, if the background is religious intolerance, a profession go neutralithy may be reassuring. It is not regarded as relevant to the job.