Toward an Understanding of Why People Discriminate: Evidence from a Series of Natural Field Experiments / Uri Gneezy, John List, Michael K. Price.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Gneezy, Uri.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

List, John.

Price, Michael K.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w17855.

NBER working paper series no. w17855

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2012.

Summary:

Social scientists have presented evidence that suggests discrimination is ubiquitous: women, nonwhites, and the elderly have been found to be the target of discriminatory behavior across several labor and product markets. Scholars have been less successful at pinpointing the underlying motives for such discriminatory patterns. We employ a series of field experiments across several market and agent types to examine the nature and extent of discrimination. Our exploration includes examining discrimination based on gender, age, sexual orientation, race, and disability. Using data from more than 3000 individual transactions, we find evidence of discrimination in each market. Interestingly, we find that when the discriminator believes the object of discrimination is controllable, any observed discrimination is motivated by animus. When the object of discrimination is not due to choice, the evidence suggests that statistical discrimination is the underlying reason for the disparate behavior.

Notes:

Print version record

February 2012.