April 12, 2007
From the desk of Jane Galt:In response to the post below, one of my commenters avers that racism is logical application of the law of averages, and the system is in fact rigged in favour of underachieving blacks.
It is arguably true that the system is so rigged in two areas--elite education and government contracting. But these two areas affect the lives of a very small percentage of American citizens. Most schools admit more than 2/3 of their students; affirmative action is irrelevant. And I hope we can all agree that working for the government shouldn't be anyone's lifelong ambition. There's pretty considerable evidence that at lower levels, being black is a substantial handicap to getting and keeping a job.
Perhaps this is a rational employer response; on average, black men are more likely to be criminals, high school dropouts, and have other traits that make them less desireable employees, than white men. But that's sort of a cop out, because most of those traits are easily discernible by, say, asking about high school graduation and criminal records. Compared to the social damage done by blanket decisions not to interview applicants with "black sounding" names, the cost of a few extra interviews where you unfortunately discover the applicant has a criminal record seems pretty trivial.
Moreover, even if such discrimination were useful, this is not a simple equilibrium. If you permit people to discriminate so that black men have to work twice as hard to get half as far as white men, then the rational response of black men is not necessarily to try four times as hard; it might be to give up. Perhaps you are the sort of extraordinary achiever who would cheerfully put out four times as much effort as your coworkers just to get the same rewards, but that is expecting too much of most ordinary human material.
In American society, racial problems are a toxic dynamic in which both sides accrue blame as they react to the reactions of the others. This is why both sides have to be prepared to work on them, rather than (as almost everyone currently seems to prefer), sitting back and demanding that the other guy make all the effort. Yes, black teenagers have to work harder in school. But white employers also have to focus on the individual, not the group. The evidence I've seen shows that this is pretty clearly not happening now.
Posted by Jane Galt at April 12, 2007 12:03 PM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links"); ?>Some of the best evidence against the statistical discrimination hypothesis (or at least a strong form of it) is research by Devah Pager at Princeton showing that most employers are more interested in hiring (otherwise identical) white men with criminal records than black men without criminal records.
Posted by: Gabriel on April 12, 2007 12:30 PMCan you link to the "names" study? As I recall, intragroup variation was much broader than the intergroup variation. "Emily" was apparently a terrible name for job applicants.
I can't find the original myself, just a hundred media stories...
Posted by: Rob Lyman on April 12, 2007 12:34 PMAt least some of the reluctance of employers to hire minority applicants is due to sheer self-protection: the fear that if a minority applicant is hired, and later has to be subjected to disciplinary action or is passed over for promotion, he or she will claim discrimination. Merely being accused of discrimination is a public relations nightmare and may result in significant economic losses.
Posted by: Peter on April 12, 2007 12:39 PMCould you share some of this evidence?
I'm not sure that the key handicap is skin color, however.
(By which I mean - given the names study you mention, and the general dislike that companies have for hiring people that can't speak in any way not reminiscent of a ghetto streetcorner and the language of thuggery - that the handicap might be a subset of black culture [that subset that encourages the above], rather than skin color or "blackness" itself.
Because if it's skin color, we should find that black people with middle-class upbringings and "normal" (European, in other words) names are also discriminated against.
Are they? I don't know, but I suspect that if they are the degree must be smaller.
I also suspect strongly that a white person with a weird name who dresses and talks like a streetcorner thug is going to have a hard time getting/keeping a job.
Such heuristics will at the same time be not "racist" at all, since they're not based on race and don't care about it at all, but disproportionately affect black people, because a disproportionate number of black people have such a background. Does that make them, in the final analysis, racist heuristics? I don't think it could.)
But perhaps I project from my biases too much and others really are just more racist than classist - but I know that my own evaluations and threat analysis go more by body language and dress/speech cues than by skin color.
I'm a lot more wary of a thug-looking white guy than I am of a black man in a suit...
Posted by: Sigivald on April 12, 2007 12:48 PMI haven't read the actual study, only the stories about it, so maybe this question has already been asked:
Is the prejudice against "black" names or just against "strange" names?
Jane, you have made some very interesting points about how much educational experience can be interpreted as signalling. Does an extremely unusual name not also do some signalling, e.g. about what that person's background and upbringing are likely to have been?
I'm not saying it's fair, I'm just saying that there may be other factors than racism at play.
Posted by: BerthaMinerva on April 12, 2007 12:51 PMAnd I hope we can all agree that working for the government shouldn't be anyone's lifelong ambition.
What a disgusting comment. Some of the best people I know are working in government jobs at lower salaries than they could command in the private sector because they want to contribute to the public good more than they want to further enrich some fat cat owner or stockholders.
Posted by: JewishAtheist on April 12, 2007 1:43 PM
I'm going to pile on with JewishAtheist. Some of the most decent and good people I know have worked for government in some capacity or other all their lives: engineers involved in atmospheric /physics/ energy research, schoolteachers (yes, there are good ones, and they are frustrated), college professors at state universities (ditto), low-paid employees of public radio stations who labor to preserve and lift the culture via music, the postman who spent many of his weekends with my Scout troop when I was a child...the list really does go on at great length.
You need to either retract, or greatly expand, that comment. It is beneath you.
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 1:50 PMJewishAtheist,
That's idiotic - most private sector workers contribute plenty to the public good by, you know, providing goods to the public.
Posted by: TWL on April 12, 2007 1:51 PMWhat a disgusting comment.
Thank you for characterizing your own comments in advance, it saves us all the trouble of reading further.
And I hope we can all agree that working for the government shouldn't be anyone's lifelong ambition
Depends on what you're talking about. Historically, the government has offered job security and decent retirement, and maybe the money and the working conditions aren't so great. Are you opposed to people making tradeoffs of this type, or are you opposed to people working for the government at all, or what?
Posted by: BP Beckley on April 12, 2007 1:54 PM"And I hope we can all agree that working for the government shouldn't be anyone's lifelong ambition."
Wonderful!
I think maybe (these days) people are racist in hiring practices only in so far as race is a signal of culture. If a certain culture is (rightly or wrongly) stereotyped as being notoriously less honest than another culture, then by hiring people from the more honest culture are we not just exercising good judgment? Of course individual honesty and skin color varies across cultures, but I fail to see the problem with this type of discrimination.
The problem comes when statistical judgments determining culture are biased...
Posted by: B.S. on April 12, 2007 1:55 PMTWL and Thorley Winston, please reconsider what you are saying. Jane's comment above clearly states that working for the government shouldn't be one's lifelong ambition, implying rather strongly that to do so is somehow a bad thing. Perhaps JewishAthiest phrased the objection poorly (and I do not agree with the last clause on "fat cats"), but even now if one wishes to teach at any level from primary school through university, the odds are one is going to work for government one's whole life. The same is largely true in many areas of research, whether funding is by paycheck or by grant/contract. And I haven't even yet mentioned the people who sign up for the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard, have I?
Please reconsider what you are saying.
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 1:58 PMLife's not fair. But those of us with better upbringing and backgrounds should use our wealth to help others. Not compel others to do the same against their own will.
When you freely give some one a hand the world is far better off than when the government takes that hand-out from you at gun point, loses 50% of it due to waste in the process and then passes the rest on to someone else who feels they deserved it in the first place.
More and more it's becoming clear to to me more people fall near two categories. People who think we should use our own agency do to something because it is right. And people who think they need to forcefully compell everyone including themselves to do something because it is right.
In matters not directly and immediately relating to security and safety I'll choose the former just about every time.
Posted by: cdub on April 12, 2007 2:04 PMGabriel:
"Some of the best evidence against the statistical discrimination hypothesis (or at least a strong form of it) is research by Devah Pager at Princeton showing that most employers are more interested in hiring (otherwise identical) white men with criminal records than black men without criminal records."
Are you claiming such a preference is statistically irrational? If so, on what basis?
Posted by: James B. Shearer on April 12, 2007 2:09 PMI love the ability of the internet to allow fact checking in near real time.
So, here's a "fact": most employers are more interested in hiring (otherwise identical) white men with criminal records than black men without criminal records.
So I go looking for it, and sure enough, here's the study: http://www.econ.brown.edu/econ/events/pager&western1.pdf
A quick read reveals the following: the study was done using testers: "well-spoken, clean-shaven, young men, aged 22 to 26." The (fake) crime in question for the white applicants? Well, what would you guess it was? Theft, maybe?
Nope. "Testers were instructed to reveal that they had recently been released from prison after serving 18 months for a drug felony (possession with intent to distribute, cocaine)". A nonviolent drug "crime". And this, on an application for an entry level job, for a young man.
The study does show convincing evidence of employer discrimination based on race. Black men are discriminated against. If you read it, you'll also see that the "criminal" white men as per above are significantly more discriminated against than non-criminal whites.
But it also seems to me that the spin coming off this thing is a bit different than the reality of what was tested. Most criminals are not nonviolent, victimless criminals.
Posted by: Leonard on April 12, 2007 2:14 PMIs the prejudice against "black" names or just against "strange" names?
The study compared black names like RaShaun with "white" names like John or Steve. What, there aren't black people with the usual names? I wonder whether the study would have turned out differently if they used normal names as the control group, then compare the degree to which black names are a detriment, as well as weird white names like, say, Butterfly or Soleil Frye, or if there's any benefit to someone being named Bob Johnson III or some such?
Posted by: Hei Lun Chan on April 12, 2007 2:17 PMCompared to the social damage done by blanket decisions not to interview applicants with "black sounding" names
I've seen the studies that supposedly proved that sort of behavior was happening, but in my opinion they were poorly constructed.
Names like "Anfernee" are "black sounding", sure, but they are also "STUPID sounding". When you compare them to "normal" names like James and Michelle -- common among both blacks AND whites -- it is impossible to know if you're measuring reaction to "black sounding" names or simply measuring reaction to weirdness.
A better study would compare "Shaliqua" to "Dweezil", not "Albert" -- i.e., compare weird "black" names to weird "white" ones.
Posted by: Dan on April 12, 2007 2:20 PMOne thing that isn't always explicitly stated: There are places where we may want to discourage individually rational discrimination, because of the externalities involved. Jane hinted at this, but didn't say it explicitly, but I think it underlies a lot of this discussion.
The usual version of this argument centers around racial profiling--blacks are much more likely than whites to be criminals, but it still has to suck to be a law-abiding black guy who can't drive home after dark without getting pulled over by the cops. It may make sense to trade off some efficiency by the police to decrease that guy's needless hassles.
Posted by: albatross on April 12, 2007 2:34 PMI've seen the studies that supposedly proved that sort of behavior was happening, but in my opinion they were poorly constructed.
Agreed, I checked out one of the more recent studies where the researchers sent out phony resumes to apply for jobs that they read about in the paper. The researchers said that they varied the resumes more than just with the name (how stupid would it be to send the same employer two exactly identical resumes from two different people) but didn’t show how you can possibly hold all of the other factors the same. Yes two applicants might have the same number of years of work experience but it may not be the same work experience just like having a six month gap in one’s employment history isn’t the same as having two three-month gaps in one’s employment history. Not to mention the fact that larger employers usually pre-screen resumes with someone in HR who glances at them for about a minute and looks for certain things to jump out at them and may discard a resume without even looking at the name.
Posted by: Thorley Winston on April 12, 2007 2:37 PM"Some of the best evidence against the statistical discrimination hypothesis (or at least a strong form of it) is research by Devah Pager at Princeton showing that most employers are more interested in hiring (otherwise identical) white men with criminal records than black men without criminal records."
And this is exactly backwards thinking.
The problem with discrimination lawsuits such as that settled out of court by Fed Ex for $54 million is that it raises the cost of hiring minorities percieved as non-cooperators. By law I have to maintain a certain ratio of minorities within my firm. But since discrimination is nearly impossible to prove at the hiring stage, yet I have to maintain this ratio, I hire many higher acheiving blacks and disregard applications submitted by blacks perceived as troublemakers. The white troublemakers have no standing to sue me so I'm willing to take a chance with them, providing I can pay them less.
Posted by: Me on April 12, 2007 2:40 PMI'll ditto the objections to the government comment. Meant tongue in cheek, I'm sure, but it comes off as snarky and closed minded. I know many folks that work in the public sector and they are not lazy incompetent unimaginative leeches, as this comment would suggest. Once upon a time this kind of work was valorised as public "service". Comments like that simply perpetuate a stereotype and denigrate the efforts of a lot of competent dedicated folks who give a damn about how our country actually functions rather than making a pile flogging widgets.
Posted by: vern on April 12, 2007 2:42 PM"I wonder whether the study would have turned out differently if they used normal names as the control group, then compare the degree to which black names are a detriment, as well as weird white names like, say, Butterfly or Soleil Frye, or if there's any benefit to someone being named Bob Johnson III or some such?"
What if the applicants had names like Bubba or Skeeter. Would we be surprised that they did not receive interviews? I doubt it. Are we prejudiced against rednecks or do their names signal low intelligence?
Posted by: Me on April 12, 2007 2:46 PMNope. "Testers were instructed to reveal that they had recently been released from prison after serving 18 months for a drug felony (possession with intent to distribute, cocaine)". A nonviolent drug "crime". And this, on an application for an entry level job, for a young man.
Thanks for the link to the study. It also says that the criminal applicants listed their parole officer as a reference for the application. I wonder if for an entry level position (movers, cooks, sales) that might actually be considered a plus because it could be used as a way of controlling a low level employee. “Step out of a line and I’ll call your PO to tell him you violated the terms of your parole.” Or maybe that’s just in the movies ;)
Posted by: Thorley Winston on April 12, 2007 2:47 PMWhat if the applicants had names like Bubba or Skeeter. Would we be surprised that they did not receive interviews? I doubt it. Are we prejudiced against rednecks or do their names signal low intelligence?
Good point, it would be interesting to see a list of the “white” names contrasted with the “black” names and which ones in each group received a call back. If one group is more heavily weighted with unusual sounding names, it could be a problem with the sample.
Posted by: Thorley Winston on April 12, 2007 2:56 PMThe commenters who talk about names reading as Black as also reading as "stupid" to their eyes are proving Jane's point.
Value judgments about African-American culture having -nothing- to do with intelligence are being considered serious and fair criteria for hiring people. People in different cultures and subcultures view names differently than others, and it's tough when your group's view is not the same as the "mainstream" view.
I wonder if for an entry level position (movers, cooks, sales) that might actually be considered a plus because it could be used as a way of controlling a low level employee. “Step out of a line and I’ll call your PO to tell him you violated the terms of your parole.” Or maybe that’s just in the movies.
Seems eminently checkable. It predicts that black men with criminal records have an easier time getting hired for low-level jobs than black men without criminal records. Also, white men with criminal records should have an easier time getting hired for those jobs than white men with criminal records.
Do you think that happens? Are there studies that show that happens?
Posted by: Jim Henley on April 12, 2007 2:59 PMI think Jane's comment about government employ has distinct merits that (surprise!) blew right past the knee-jerk reactionists.
1. Jane is not an uberlibertarian, but she drinks the tea on ocassion. Someone with that philosophy is not going to want to see "government employment" lionized as being an ideal career path.
2. We have a wealth of evidence from Latin America of what happens when exactly that problem arises, and it contributes greatly to a gross abuse of patronage, sinecure, and corruption. The result is an inflated government that wastes vast sums of money employing people who are doing nothing or performing way below optimal.
That said, I have known a few hard-working civil servants myself, and have nothing against them. But I would rather see a new generation of workforce participants seeking a particular job, and perhaps finding a job opportunity in civil service, than to have government employment itself as their career goal.
Posted by: anony-mouse on April 12, 2007 3:04 PMValue judgments about African-American culture having -nothing- to do with intelligence are being considered serious and fair criteria for hiring people. People in different cultures and subcultures view names differently than others, and it's tough when your group's view is not the same as the "mainstream" view.
Except that "African-American culture" traditionally did no such thing; it seems to be a recent invention that smacks of either an effort to be different for difference' sake (tribalism), or flat out illiteracy. We have the same thing going on among lower-income white and hispanic communities, frequently in the form of common names being re-spelled with such sloppy phonetics that one wonders if the mother/parents ever learned to read. Sadly, whether inadvertant or deliberate, she/they have imparted a distinct lifetime disadvantage upon the child.
Posted by: anony-mouse on April 12, 2007 3:13 PMOne of the best demonstrations of institutional racism is that those people who do succeed are smaller in number than would be predicted demographically, but also greater in abilitiy than the majority average.
Most people who rise above a glass ceiling has to be significantly better than the average mainstream worker to do so. And a measure of their average skill, to the degree it can be measured, is an excellent gauge of the degree of unfair discrimination. There's a name for this, but I can't for the life of me recall it.
Posted by: Ryan W on April 12, 2007 3:21 PMJim: being a white criminal w/ a parole officer was not an asset in the Pager study. That by comparison to being white but not criminal.
NOw, it may be that being on parole (and giving as a reference your PO) is an asset vs being past your parole period.
To find out for sure, I suppose you'd want to test some "criminal" applicants without POs, some with. But I rather doubt anyone will do that study. There's not a lot of interest in finding out ways that convicts are discriminated against, whereas the race question is of the highest priority in academia and government.
Posted by: Leonard on April 12, 2007 3:22 PMExcept that "African-American culture" traditionally did no such thing; it seems to be a recent invention that smacks of either an effort to be different for difference' sake (tribalism), or flat out illiteracy.
If you want to assume people name their children for reasons that you judge to be malicious, sure, but it would be more instructive to give people the benefit of the doubt and investigate why they choose to create new names from scratch or use real words like Precious, Destiny, or Justus. It's done from a sense of aesthetics that is distinctive, because parents find these names to be pretty, or distinctive, or pleasant to hear. It's done to communicate how the parent feels about the child. It's done to give a child a unique (or should I say "Uneek") identity so that maybe they'll feel special and different from other children.
These may not be your values when naming a child. I'm pretty sure they aren't. They certainly aren't everyone's. But when you take these perfectly understandable, human impulses and judge them according to your own standards as "stupid" or "illiterate" you are making a value judgment based on your own culture to the disadvantage of someone not privileged enough to grow up with your taste in baby names.
And what the hell is more tribalist than saying "I won't hire someone because their parents didn't give them a good [white] name"? I mean, read what you wrote again--you just chalked up bad motives to African-American parents for giving children names differently than most white parents do. Does not sound tribal to you?
Also, as for illiteracy--you've been misspelling "anonymous" for years. ;)
Posted by: Brittain33 on April 12, 2007 3:29 PM"Value judgments about African-American culture having -nothing- to do with intelligence are being considered serious and fair criteria for hiring people. People in different cultures and subcultures view names differently than others, and it's tough when your group's view is not the same as the "mainstream" view."
Roland Fryer has done work on just this and finds that African-Americans who name their kids distinctively black names tend to come from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Posted by: Me on April 12, 2007 3:38 PMRoland Fryer has done work on just this and finds that African-Americans who name their kids distinctively black names tend to come from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
That may well be true. That then brings us around to the original point of this serious of blog posts. How meritocratic a system do we have when lots of white people apparently feel it's okay to ridicule and discriminate against people based on their names when those names correlate with an upbringing that won't teach the skills, confidence, and presentation expected in many jobs?
Posted by: Brittain33 on April 12, 2007 3:40 PManony-mouse, I think you are splitting hairs just about as finely as possible. For Jane to decide to drink that Libertarian Lapsang at this date, after coming out for mandatory medical testing of vaccines on children is absurd, that horse left the barn and the barn has burned down. With respect to South America and other climes, you are comparing apples and apricots. People go to work at different jobs for all sorts of reasons, and maybe in Libertopia someone who wanted to study high-energy physics would sign up with any of several private laboratories. Here in the real world, if you want to research any of a long list of topics, you are going to nurse on the government teat.
I don't think you or Jane have a leg to stand on in this case.
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 3:46 PMIt also says that the criminal applicants listed their parole officer as a reference for the application. I wonder if for an entry level position (movers, cooks, sales) that might actually be considered a plus because it could be used as a way of controlling a low level employee. “Step out of a line and I’ll call your PO to tell him you violated the terms of your parole.”
Some employers might think that giving a second chance to a guy who's had a few scrapes with the law is the right thing to do. It's not even very risky, if it's a low-level job with no access to money or valuables.
Posted by: Peter on April 12, 2007 3:56 PMI'm with Jane on the comment about government jobs. It's not that working for the government is necessarily a bad thing (though it very often is), but rather that I don't want to live in a society where attitudes such as JewishAtheist's--that working for the government is morally superior to working in the private sector and that those who choose the latter must be motivated by greed to ignore a nobler calling--are commonplace.
Posted by: Brandon Berg on April 12, 2007 3:56 PMTo find out for sure, I suppose you'd want to test some "criminal" applicants without POs, some with. But I rather doubt anyone will do that study. There's not a lot of interest in finding out ways that convicts are discriminated against, whereas the race question is of the highest priority in academia and government.
Leonard, let's keep in mind that the original impetus to this research is that there is an easily discernable racial disparity in employment. Clever people suggested non-racial contributing factors, such as employment histories and socioeconomic background that could explain it, and other clever people started trying to design studies to exclude them, so that they would be measuring the effect of race itself as directly as possible. Again, this all started because academics, you, me and everybody else on the planet noticed that, "Gee, black unemployment is much higher than white unemployment."
Nobody noticed, "Gee, felons sure do have an easier time getting hired than non-felons, ceteris parabus. I wonder what's up with that? We'd better design a bunch of studies." I suggest that the reason nobody noticed this is that it doesn't happen.
Posted by: Jim Henley on April 12, 2007 3:59 PMAnd I hope we can all agree that working for the government shouldn't be anyone's lifelong ambition.
That's right. No one should ever aspire to be a policeman, fireman, soldier, public school teacher, congressman, mayor, city council member, prosecutor, district attorney, judge, public defender, or President of the fucking United States. Because they're all useless, wasteful government jobs whose salaries are paid for by unjust redistributive taxes levied upon the ranks of god-like, Randian supermen of the private market, who we all know are the true drivers of human progress.
To a gas chamber, I will go!
Well, I hope to God it's at least a government-approved and -licensed gas chamber. Some of us need the inspector jobs, to keep us in cash till the welfare state swells large enough for us to switch over.
Posted by: albatross on April 12, 2007 4:12 PMI hope you don't mind an off-topic comment, but I think this is important:
Re: the Iraq war in general
(also see this post)
Ever since the months prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, there have been a few reports in the newspapers that the Central Intelligence Agency was casting aspersions on the intelligence the White House was relying on to justify the war. The CIA has never given a position on whether the war is needed or justified or said that Bush is wrong to go to war. But doesn't it seem much more likely that the CIA is an extremely right wing organization than a left wing one? After all, even if the people working for them and at least a lot of the leadership really wanted a war for their own reasons, there are a lot of reasons for them to not want to tie their credibility to what they know is faulty information. They and their personnel, present and former, could use other means of promoting the Iraq war, and still be motivated to make the statements in the media. If the CIA got behind faulty information, they would have to make a choice between whether they would be involved in scamming the American people and the world once the military had invaded Iraq and no weapons were found- so: 1) Imagine the incredible difficulties involved in pulling off a hoax that weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq. Imagine all the people you would have to be able to show the weapons to- the inspectors from the UN / the international community, the American press, statesmen, etc. Then imagine the difficulties of substantiating that story to people who would examine it- the lack of witnesses to a production plant that made the weapons or to transportation operations or storage of the weapons during Hussein's regime of them. 2) If the story fell apart upon inspection or the CIA tried not to hoax it at all, imagine the loss of credibility they would suffer. The CIA, it is safe to bet, does not want to be known to the American people as a group that lies to them to send them to war. Even within the CIA there could be disagreement among people about how involved they should be in promoting the war or the neo-con agenda more broadly, so the CIA would have to worry about lying to and managing its own people after trying so hard to get them to trust their superiors in the agency, and perhaps there simply might be too many people in the agency who knew enough about what was going on in Iraq to know if someone was deceiving people to promote this war.
So there is a lot of reason to be cautious against being seen as endorsing what they knew was false intelligence even if they were very strong supporters of going to war.
Granted, it’s certainly possible the CIA could have changed their minds about the war, as a lot of people have, and could now be trying to move the nation closer to withdrawal.
James,
Yes, I was claiming that it is irrational (statistically or otherwise) to prefer a white ex-con to a law-abiding black guy. The whole premise of statistical discrimination is that when information about a trait is difficult to measure it is rational to use Bayesian inference known group rates. However in this case an important question (is this guy a criminal) is known with certainty so there is no need to make such an inference. While it is possible that there may be other rational reasons to prefer whites (such as the risk of wrongful termination suits) I'm very skeptical that such rational problems/risks outweigh the difference between an ex-con and someone with a clean record.
Leonard,
I'm not sure if there's anything to merit the "gotcha" tone of your comment. In any case two points:
a) Pager now has a ginormous NSF grant and will be replicating the experiment with far more variables. (I believe one of the new variables is the type of conviction). In any case I think it's defensible to make the original variable a drug conviction as these are so numerous.
b) The Pager and Western paper was only one of the studies. The original cite is AJS 2003. You can get all of the papers at Pager's website:
http://sociology.princeton.edu/Faculty/Pager/
Brittain33 says:
"That may well be true. That then brings us around to the original point of this serious of blog posts. How meritocratic a system do we have when lots of white people apparently feel it's okay to ridicule and discriminate against people based on their names when those names correlate with an upbringing that won't teach the skills, confidence, and presentation expected in many jobs?"
Let's say that LaShanta with a degree from Harvard applies for a high level position at your company. Let's also say that Emily from, say, Cal-State Hayward also applies for the same position. You know nothing else but what I've just noted. If it's all of the information I have I'd pick LaShanta hands down.
We struggle with information problems all the time and, as Michael Spence explained, job market signals are a means to weed out candidates. One common metric is intelligence, which is difficult to discover without great cost, hence we look for signals. Distinctively black names have been shown by the likes of Roland Fryer (a black economist at Harvard) to be pretty accurate predictors of lower intelligence, on average.
See also the work by Sniderman et. al. who demonstrate that it's not necessarily a racial, but a cultural issue. When blacks signal their cooperativeness in terms of dress, family status, etc., whites go out of their way to help them. Come to the table with grilles, the knit cap, bling-bling, and black or white you're not likely to be hired. Just like coming to the table with tattoos, although they're becoming more acceptable in the mainstream culture.
Posted by: Me on April 12, 2007 5:14 PMI think there is a distinction between aspiring to a career that happens to involve working for the government and seeking to be a careerist in a generic government job. There are a lot of jobs where a devoted and talented person can make a difference - teacher, President - but those make up a small percentage of government jobs. Most of them are tedious jobs that genuinely need doing, but which can be filled with nearly interchangeable persons. The only real appeal of those positions is that they are predictable and safe, usually life-long posts. Unions have made it almost impossible to get rid of untalented timeservers who don't even pretend to do their job, while simultaneously forbidding anything that smacks of merit bonuses and promotions that jump over seniority. There is no point to being a total rockstar in a clerical job at the DMV, no-one will reward you or even notice. The burn-out above you can't be gotten rid of, so you have no chance at promotion until he dies in his chair.
(I say that having recently had a problem with the DMV that was eventually dealt with through the help of cheerful friendly persons. But not a single one of them treated the broken process as something that needed actual fixing instead of a work-around.)
Posted by: reemul on April 12, 2007 5:14 PMGabriel, I am not claiming I "gotcha"ed anyone other than maybe myself. When I saw the claim that employers treat black men similar to white felons, I thought it was hard to believe. So I checked.
If others believed it credulously, gotcha. Else, no big deal.
I agree that using a drug conviction for criminals is defensible. Just that I would not spin that as a "criminal". I am certainly not saying this is Pager's fault -- almost certainly it's the media in between her, and whoever I heard it from. I do notice, though, you continue to talk about "white ex-con"s, without noting that the "con" here is a single victimless drug crime.
Me, I don't think of victimless crimes as being the same category as victimful crimes. People clearly differ on this, but I don't think I am alone. I also don't think of one-time losers the way I think of three-time losers.
I am completely supportive of the idea of Pager doing more research of this type. Hopefully she can do some tests with a drug conviction, and some with a (say) theft conviction. My intuition is that she'll see serious differences between them. Similarly for a single drug conviction as versus several.
I am also curious to know how much discrimination happens for more skilled jobs. My guess is that it goes away proportionate to the increase in information from legal-to-use proxies for IQ: high school grades, graduation, college admission to good school, college grades, graduation, etc.
Posted by: Leonard on April 12, 2007 5:34 PMfrom Peter:
"At least some of the reluctance of employers to hire minority applicants is due to sheer self-protection: the fear that if a minority applicant is hired, and later has to be subjected to disciplinary action or is passed over for promotion, he or she will claim discrimination. Merely being accused of discrimination is a public relations nightmare and may result in significant economic losses."
I just wanted to throw this quote back in to the mix. I have personally witnessed this phenomenon both at the university level and at the level of a service worker (I'm still in college) where an employee was fired for legitimate reasons (lifting food and petty cash from the restaurant, in the case of the service job, and general low performance in another) and then spun around and SCREAMED discrimination with a protracted legal fight that cost the company infinitely too much money, when they were responding to normal behavior, that would get EXACTLY the same treatment were the employee white.
I noticed, too, that because of that one person suing after being fired, several (though not all) of the black employees lowered productivity (it was frustrating!) feeling they had the job security of being able to pitch the same fit. Again, this is just at a little restaurant in VA, but it seems like a decent microcosm of the employment market. Consequently, I have never seen another black person hired at that restaurant both when I worked there and since I've returned to my hometown (I ate there frequently even after I stopped working there.)
And, knowing the store owner/manager, the subsequent "discrimination" in hiring was not out of prejudicial racism inherent to their belief system; they were responding to a wanton abuse of the tort system.
Granted, race relations are not always peachy-keen in Central VA, but I'd say we've been a lot better about things like that as a community, especially in terms of combatting white "hate-speech" without resorting automatically to lawsuits, knee-jerk flare-ups of every other unrelated community conflict, etc. Racism is still pretty pervasive, especially outside of the yuppified city of Charlottesville and suburbs, but I think the hiring/firing/discrimination tiff still can stand as an example of what Peter was getting at.
Posted by: Neal on April 12, 2007 5:50 PMWhite crowd alert!
I can't imagine that the black/white tester hypothesis is not without significant problems. You simply can't expect the same results in Philadelphia as Los Angeles as Brooklyn as Atlanta. Each of those towns has their own set of racial memories and what makes sense with regard to what constants ethnics express as their racial identity is completely different. Here in Los Angeles, there is nothing that even approaches an Irish Catholic neighborhood and in Philadelphia there's nothing like a black upscale suburb. Simply adding four variables, religion, politics, locale and educational achievement completely wrecks the simplistic conclusions (which themselves take on different meaning depending on your type of wishful thinking around race) that get debated.
The last time I checked, the most significant socio-economic factor aligned with race was where people live. That's Massey & Denton for those of you who are academically inclined and want references. The idea is simple and basic. Jim Crow and segregation worked, and the majority of African Americans remain living in the same places whitefolks would have them live. We should all intuitively understand this, and so it makes sense that we would generate hypotheticals about Oprah in New Hampshire. In fact, blackfolks in New Hampshire are much better off economically speaking, than those in Raleigh NC.
So one angle I would propose is to consider the bias of self-selection in job applications. It's not as if folks just select a place of employment at random, any more than people select a sport or religion or spouse (or meeting place to find a spouse) at random. Blackfolks know, for example, here in LA, that you can get a good job at FedEx.
Oh. And as for the white crowd alert, how do you suppose it is that I am the first individual to self-identify as black in this thread? Does Jane Galt discriminate against black readers? Anyone up for proposing a study?
BTW, nobody in their right mind should desire a career in government, unless of course they lack the experience and imagination to consider that CEOs are beneficial to society. What trait should we call that?
Posted by: Cobb on April 12, 2007 5:56 PMGabriel:
"Yes, I was claiming that it is irrational (statistically or otherwise) to prefer a white ex-con to a law-abiding black guy. The whole premise of statistical discrimination is that when information about a trait is difficult to measure it is rational to use Bayesian inference known group rates. However in this case an important question (is this guy a criminal) is known with certainty so there is no need to make such an inference. While it is possible that there may be other rational reasons to prefer whites (such as the risk of wrongful termination suits) I'm very skeptical that such rational problems/risks outweigh the difference between an ex-con and someone with a clean record."
First the trait in question, "propensity to commit crimes", is not binary as you assume. Second the number of crimes you have committed in the past is not a perfect measure of your propensity to commit future crimes since for example you may have been an otherwise law abiding person unluckily subjected to a great temptation. Third your criminal record is not a perfect account of how many crimes you have committed since most crimes do not lead to convictions and some convictions are wrongful. As a result some people with criminal records are better risks than some people without criminal records. A criminal record is a risk factor but it does not necessarily outweigh other risk factors. A white man with a minor criminal record is still likely to be a better risk statistically than a black man without a criminal record.
Posted by: James B. Shearer on April 12, 2007 6:06 PM"A white man with a minor criminal record is still likely to be a better risk statistically than a black man without a criminal record."
Which is why we pledge allegiance to the flag which promises liberty and justice for all statistically equal people.
Posted by: Cobb on April 12, 2007 6:20 PMI think there is a distinction between aspiring to a career that happens to involve working for the government and seeking to be a careerist in a generic government job.
There are actually people out there who consciously and actively aspire to be "government careerists?" News to me. I guess there are also people actually out there who consciously and actively aspire to be "brown-noses," like that little kid in the Monster.com ads.
There are a lot of jobs where a devoted and talented person can make a difference - teacher, President - but those make up a small percentage of government jobs. Most of them are tedious jobs that genuinely need doing, but which can be filled with nearly interchangeable persons.
Ah, the old saw about bureaucratic paper-pushers. Usually made by people who have little idea about how government actually functions.
If I had a magic wishing crystal, I'd wish that Jane, and Brittain33, and a few others got to work as mid level managers at some company with at least a billion dollar budget. Let them take a swing at doing the job they so casually critique. Let them do a few things like:
* Plow through a hundred resumes on a Saturday to find five candidates that look good for the Monday meeting with your boss, that also meet the organizational voluntary/mandatory goals for diversity. Be prepared to be called a racist/sexist/etc.ist when the applicant pool fails to include sufficient minorities; not in a personal way, just as part of the job. Flak-catching is a function of middle management.
* Mediate the personality dispute between employee A and employee B, knowing full well that employee A is a jerk who works hard at being a jerk, who has peaked out in terms of a career at the company, but who is also in a protected class and has gotten midlevel managers in trouble before with thinly-veiled threats of lawsuits.
* Deal with the employee who keeps getting caught with liquor in the desk, who is a real morale-depression machine when drinking...but who also has been with the company for a long time, still does good work when sober, is a personal friend of a high level manager, and is also a protected minority.
All the while doing your own work, and ensuring that all company, local, state and federal regulations are scrupulously followed, because if they aren't and someone higher up finds out, it's your job.
I'd like to see that, for all sorts of high-minded people who just know they could do that job better. I'd like to see what they'd post after 3 or 4 years of that kind of life, yes I would.
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 6:44 PMOn the race issue, Don Imus has been fired now by CBS for making the "nappy-haired ho" remark, an egregiously racial slur. Why the uproar from the likes of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton who raise no ruckus about rap songs whose lyrics are more inflammatory and derogatory towards black women than anything Imus has ever said?
Posted by: Me on April 12, 2007 6:45 PMActually, I believe that Jesse Jackson has publicly taken rappers and hiphop gangsta types to task, it just doesn't get reported much on CNN/NY Times, etc. I'm told that Sharpton has done that too, but frankly what Sharpton does is of no interest to me, because IMO he should have been put in jail after the Freddy's Fashion Mart / Crown Heights deaths for incitement to commit murder. Just my opinion, though.
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 7:01 PMJane / Megan,
I would be interested in you backing up this claim:
"There's pretty considerable evidence that at lower levels, being black is a substantial handicap to getting and keeping a job."
This seems to be untrue once you control for quality and beliefs (though there are plenty of exceptions). It seems blacks are falling behind long before reaching the job market, i.e., schools. There are a bunch of reasons for that. Moreover, many blacks are hurt by the same beliefs and subculture that embraces the N word in top selling rap music.
In other words, R Kelly is a criminal and should be shunned. Embracing R Kelly suggests a lack of judgment that would be beneficial in the job market.
Note, my comments have NOTHING to do with genetics or ability. What I am saying is that I expect poor performance out of almost ANY person that has poor educational foundation AND who shares the views of some famous playas.
And that has NOTHING to do with Imus.
Posted by: Stephen W. Stanton on April 12, 2007 7:40 PMAnd what the hell is more tribalist than saying "I won't hire someone because their parents didn't give them a good [white] name"? I mean, read what you wrote again--you just chalked up bad motives to African-American parents for giving children names differently than most white parents do. Does not sound tribal to you?
Hold on, who ascribed motives? I am suggesting that this appears to be the reasoning; there may be all kinds of reasons for the reasoning, but adopting habits that are likely to raise conflict in society generally is not the best-known method for entering broader society.
Also, as for illiteracy--you've been misspelling "anonymous" for years. ;)
Squeak, squeak. More cheese, please :D
Posted by: anony-mouse on April 12, 2007 8:05 PManony-mouse, I think you are splitting hairs just about as finely as possible. For Jane to decide to drink that Libertarian Lapsang at this date, after coming out for mandatory medical testing of vaccines on children is absurd, that horse left the barn and the barn has burned down.
Argumenta ad hominem tu quoque. Look it up.
With respect to South America and other climes, you are comparing apples and apricots.
And I was careful to use language indicating that I was not ascribing that phenomenon to sole or even primary culpability in the various problems Latin American socieites have. It is, however, a fairly widespread and significant problem and generally indicative of a society that has a weak public economy and social stratification. Healthy societies with a strong middle class generally don't have a substantial portion of their population lionizing government employment, although some may be employed there, enjoy it, and do good work.
People go to work at different jobs for all sorts of reasons, and maybe in Libertopia someone who wanted to study high-energy physics would sign up with any of several private laboratories. Here in the real world, if you want to research any of a long list of topics, you are going to nurse on the government teat.
No doubt. However, you just described an extraordinarily small segment of the population that has little or no bearing on the broader argument.
I don't think you or Jane have a leg to stand on in this case.
Nor will you by the time you get through pulverizing your knee on the bottom of the table, seeing as bones take 6 to 8 weeks to set. Out of curiosity, which of your oxen did I gore with my statements?
Posted by: anony-mouse on April 12, 2007 8:13 PMHere's another scenario for all the experts.
Your workgroup desperately needs a certain technical position filled. The demand for people with the skillset is huge right now. The first applicant pool was a total bust; nobody was qualified. Your boss's boss has made it clear that someone better be hired out of the current pool. Looking over the 20 resumes, you see that 15 aren't even remotely close to the technical requirements. Of the remaining 5, 2 have salary requests far beyond your budget and are probably "white males". Looking at the other three, you see they barely meet the requirements. Only one of the 5 is obviously from a protected class, but the cover letter contains a major grammar error & there's an obvious spelling error in the resume, which normally would be enough to disqualify.
If you take your boss all five, you'll hear muttering about how you are deliberately offering only the unqualified minority. If you do not take the obvious protected-class application, you'll be subtly accused of refusing to consider minorities. Either way, your boss will mutter about your obvious bigotry, but low enough that only you and the desk can hear it, so you'll have no justifiable grounds for a complaint.
So, armchair experts on Human Resources, what do you do now? Please share your wisdom with all of us.
In response to the post below, one of my commenters avers that racism is logical application of the law of averages, and the system is in fact rigged in favour of underachieving blacks.
Keep in mind the findings of the Brookings Institute, that when we control for IQ, that minorities earn higher incomes than Whites:
Black women earn 5 percent more per hour than white women with the same AFQT score. AFQT score is not simply a proxy for race in these regressions. Table 14-2 shows the relationship between AFQT score and wages for blacks, whites, and Hispanics.
[ . . . . ]
Basic cognitive skills, as measured by the AFQT, raise the wages of blacks at least as much as they raise the wages of whites. In short, basic skills do influence wages and a large fraction of the black-white wage gap reflects a skill gap that predates labor market entry.
I wrote:
anony-mouse, I think you are splitting hairs just about as finely as possible. For Jane to decide to drink that Libertarian Lapsang at this date, after coming out for mandatory medical testing of vaccines on children is absurd, that horse left the barn and the barn has burned down.
Argumenta ad hominem tu quoque. Look it up.
None of the Latin words above apply here: Jane handed in her Libertarian card in favor of the State-As-Big-Sibling full dinner-pail a while back, it's a bit late for her to claim residence in Galt's Gulch. I hope this is clear this time?
Me wrote:
With respect to South America and other climes, you are comparing apples and apricots.
Anony-mouse
And I was careful to use language indicating that I was not ascribing that phenomenon to sole or even primary culpability in the various problems Latin American socieites have. It is, however, a fairly widespread and significant problem and generally indicative of a society that has a weak public economy and social stratification. Healthy societies with a strong middle class generally don't have a substantial portion of their population lionizing government employment, although some may be employed there, enjoy it, and do good work.
It appears we are talking past each other, then, because I really don't see what you are referring to among black people as a whole. Sure, there's people of all sorts who yearn for a civil-service hammock to lie in, but they still seem to be the minority.
Me wrote:
People go to work at different jobs for all sorts of reasons, and maybe in Libertopia someone who wanted to study high-energy physics would sign up with any of several private laboratories. Here in the real world, if you want to research any of a long list of topics, you are going to nurse on the government teat.
Anony-mouse:
No doubt. However, you just described an extraordinarily small segment of the population that has little or no bearing on the broader argument.
Oh, dear, did I only give one example and thus confuse you? I do apologize, and will try again: if you want a career as a soldier, sailor, Marine, Air Force pilot, social welfare worker, police officer, firefighter, public health worker, special-education teacher, primary teacher, secondary teacher, or many, many, many, many, many other ones I have not listed, then you will wind up working for government in this real and flawed world. I do hope this clears things up for you?
Me wrote:
I don't think you or Jane have a leg to stand on in this case.
Anony-mouse:
Nor will you by the time you get through pulverizing your knee on the bottom of the table, seeing as bones take 6 to 8 weeks to set. Out of curiosity, which of your oxen did I gore with my statements?
My knee seems to be just fine, maybe I should put a banjo on it just to complete the tableau? The only oxen that's being gored here appears to be yours, although I can't fathom what it is. Did the postman mangle a magazine recently, or something?
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 8:34 PMSince I may not have been clear enough, Anony-mouse, I'll add this on. I know a man who from the age of 6 or so wanted only to be in the Army. His sole ambition was to be in a combat arm. Clearly Jane has a problem with him, because there's a clear shortage of private armies in the United States right now; no one should actually want to have a career in the government commanding tank squadrons as part of the Army, right? Should significant numbers of people desire to do that, it's bad for the economy according to you. I can make similar comments about an Air Force F-16 driver with over 20 years time in, sailors who wanted nothing else but running attack subs, etc. but surely by now the point is clear? I do hope so. Put some ice on that knee of yours, too. I'm sure it's banged up badly by now.
Posted by: ellipsis on April 12, 2007 8:49 PMOne thing to keep in mind is that adults can, and often do, change their names. If Lasquisha gets through a good college and gets a good degree, she's smart enough to see the benefits of changing her name to "Lucy." She can still go by Lasquisha when she's with her family, but "Lucy" sells better in the big world outside the 'hood.
I have heard that giving children "mainstream" names, like Tom, Joe, Susan or Jane, can bring people under serious pressure in ghetto communities. "What's the matter, you think you're better than us or what?" they'll ask. And the children themselves will be targeted and ridiculed for having "white" names.
If ghetto culture wasn't so dysfunctional, this wouldn't be much of a problem, but as it is, these names do tend to signal a person who's likely to be more trouble than he or she is worth. Kind of like speaking thick Cockney or Glasgow-slums talk in the UK---you have to be _really_ qualified and good at your work to get hired if that's the way you talk. Yes, it's unfair, but that's how people are.
Posted by: Technomad on April 12, 2007 10:16 PMMost schools admit more than 2/3 of their students; affirmative action is irrelevant.
The second half of that sentence doesn't follow from the first half of it. The only way affirmative action could be irrelevant is if universities admitted 100% of their applicants.
The University of California system, when I attended it, ran applicants' GPA and SAT scores through a formula to determine their admissibility. Certain favored classes of people -- blacks, Hispanics, handicapped people, etc -- got a substantial bonus on this formula, equal to a few tenths of a GPA point.
This meant, among other things, that you knew right off the bat that none of the black students you met had had to be as smart as, say, the Asian students in order to get in, or get a scholarship, or get the college of their choice. The median UC student, upon meeting a black fellow student, knew "odds are this guy's not as smart as me". This sort of thing re-enforces the stereotype that blacks and Hispanics are dumber than whites and Asians by ensuring that the average black or Hispanic student you run in to IS, in fact, dumber than the average white or Asian student you run in to. The bigger the affirmative action incentives, the bigger the difference in ability.
In contrast, the company that I work for is color-blind in its hiring practices. When we hire a black developer or a Hispanic executive, the other employees know that we aren't just "celebrating diversity" by hiring some marginally-qualified employee -- we're doing it because we think that person is the best candidate for the job.
Posted by: Dan on April 12, 2007 10:18 PMMe:
Imus' racial comment affected who was willing to sponsor his show. That cut off his income stream, which meant he lost his job. (But he'll probably be able to find someone who wants his name/listeners enough to live with the smaller pool of advertisers.)
Gangster rappers aren't in the same position. Their income mostly comes from people who don't want to distance themselves from the message. Teenaged boys often *like* music that offends their parents. You can imagine some radio stations refusing to play that stuff, perhaps in response to boycott threats. And plenty of people do complain about rap lyrics. But the situations aren't the same.
Posted by: albatross on April 12, 2007 10:52 PMMost schools admit more than 2/3 of their students
That may be so, but a degree from an "admits almost anyone" college is generally less marketable - often much less - than a degree from a college with selective admissions. In addition, certain programs at otherwise nonselective colleges may have selective admissions; often, these are the more marketable programs such as engineering and nursing.
Posted by: Peter on April 12, 2007 11:24 PMmaybe the money and the working conditions aren't so great
Nonsense. Gov't pay and working conditions for what is expected are quite good.
Most schools admit more than 2/3 of their students
Are the remainder sneaking in the back door? I was under the impression that they admit 3/3 of their students by definition. ;)
Posted by: Eric H on April 12, 2007 11:59 PMNone of the Latin words above apply here: Jane handed in her Libertarian card in favor of the State-As-Big-Sibling full dinner-pail a while back
Exactly, tu quoque.
Since I may not have been clear enough, Anony-mouse, I'll add this on. I know a man who from the age of 6 or so wanted only to be in the Army. His sole ambition was to be in a combat arm.
That's a job description, not a case of wanting to work for the government for its own sake. I believe I was clear that there is a difference in wanting a job for the job's sake, and simply wanting to "work for the government" which seemed to be the gist of Jane's comment. Else, as someone else pointed out, and then as you pointed out, you can pretty much kill off policemen, firemen, etc. as a public service employment. That's not a position I have ever supported, nor am I supporting it now.
The only oxen that's being gored here appears to be yours
Nope, mice don't keep oxen. It's not a pretty site when they try.
Posted by: anony-mouse on April 13, 2007 1:19 AMBringing up research physicists or spirited public servants as an example for what goes on in public service is ridiculous. The majority of people on the government payroll have long succumbed to their environment, are mired in mediocrity and office politics.
Nothing wrong with people trying to protect their jobs. But while in the private sector you do it by making your services worthwhile, in the public sector you get tenure. After that you pretend to be useful for as long as you have, then stop pretending and just wait for retirement.
And if anyone one wonders where did respect for public service go, have a look at public employee unions, a.k.a. the enemies of future genereations.
In a few days, I can stop working for the government. Tax Freedom day.
Posted by: MarkD on April 13, 2007 7:30 AMDid the names study try including resumes with names like "Cletus" or "Bubba"? Those aren't "black" names, but they are low-class names (apologies to anyone with those names) and I bet they'd hit many of the same road blocks. It would've provided a nice control for race vs class.
Posted by: Josh on April 13, 2007 8:33 AMAs I recall, the names used in the names study were chosen systematically: They looked at common names associated with low income blacks and low income whites, as well as common names associated with high income blacks and high income whites. The terms "common", "high income", and "low income" were based on statistical data, not media stereotypes. And the "common" part was key, because the names associated with the very highest and very lowest incomes may be highly atypical, and not representative of a larger group of people.
It's been a while since I read the study, but as I recall the general trend was that high income names were generally associated with more callbacks, i.e. they'd send a resume in response to a job ad, and see if the employer called back. Likewise, low income names were generally associated with fewer callbacks. And, as I recall, the racial effect was statistically significant. There were some anomalous names from the different categories, names that performed better or worse than the rest of the names in the category, but the overall trends were statistically significant.
Also, one could raise a valid objection about the fact that some resumes are just not suited for some jobs. The point, however, is that if you use a large sample (i.e. respond to a large number of jobs in the same general category) and design several resumes with nearly identical qualifications (tweaking details, of course, but ensuring that the companies worked for and schools attended are comparable), and randomly send resumes to different jobs, then if there's a trend you can attribute it to the names.
Finally, while a number of points have been raised about why employers might respond differently to resumes with certain names on them, the point of the study was not to read the mind of the employer. The point was to measure whether certain names elicit certain responses. Apparently they do.
Those who want to justify those responses are of course free to do so, but some of the "justifications" offered say a lot about the people offering them.
Posted by: thoreau on April 13, 2007 10:03 AMIt's so very fascinating to read so many (obviously white) commenters express their disbelief upon reading any suggestion that racial discrimination in America has a significant impact on the lives of well qualified minorities. As a member of a minority group that is very underrepresented in my line of work, it is in turn very hard for me to believe that race does not matter, and that discrimination is all about class, as some commenters suggest. Class matters a lot as well, don't get me wrong. But in my mind it takes an embarrassing degree of naivety or disingenuousness to suggest that the effects of racial discrimination are negligible in comparison to those of class discrimination, particularly in light of the popularity in America of biologically essentialist explanations of IQ differences between groups.
Posted by: pedro on April 13, 2007 10:09 AMI wrote:
None of the Latin words above apply here: Jane handed in her Libertarian card in favor of the State-As-Big-Sibling full dinner-pail a while back
Anony-mouse:
Exactly, tu quoque.
Not by any definition I've ever seen.
Me:
Since I may not have been clear enough, Anony-mouse, I'll add this on. I know a man who from the age of 6 or so wanted only to be in the Army. His sole ambition was to be in a combat arm.
Anony-mouse:
That's a job description, not a case of wanting to work for the government for its own sake.
That's hair splitting, as the government has a monopoly on armies, at least at this time.
I believe I was clear that there is a difference in wanting a job for the job's sake, and simply wanting to "work for the government" which seemed to be the gist of Jane's comment.
You are reading Jane's comment differently than I am, which is why we are talking past each other.
Else, as someone else pointed out, and then as you pointed out, you can pretty much kill off policemen, firemen, etc. as a public service employment. That's not a position I have ever supported, nor am I supporting it now.
I think you are coming closer to my position, then.
Me wrote:
The only oxen that's being gored here appears to be yours
Anony-mouse
Nope, mice don't keep oxen. It's not a pretty site when they try.
I can believe this last statement, neither mice nor oxen are very good at HTML, let alone XML...
Posted by: ellipsis on April 13, 2007 11:08 AM"Finally, while a number of points have been raised about why employers might respond differently to resumes with certain names on them, the point of the study was not to read the mind of the employer. The point was to measure whether certain names elicit certain responses. Apparently they do.
Those who want to justify those responses are of course free to do so, but some of the "justifications" offered say a lot about the people offering them."
Isn't this the pot calling the kettle black. "The point was to measure whether certain names elicit certain responses. Apparently they do." So we can simply take this and say employers are blatantly racist because they respond to black sounding names differently than they respond to white sounding names? And then any "justification" "says a lot about the people offerng them? "We're saying that the results prove racism and anyone offering a rational explanation proves racism."
Too many other studies have dealth with the asymmetric information and signaling problems, offering reasonable explanations for such results.
Posted by: Me on April 13, 2007 11:14 AMBoth *sides*?
I'm sorry, I only hold individuals responsible for their acts.
Posted by: Brett on April 13, 2007 12:42 PMthe point of the study was not to read the mind of the employer. The point was to measure whether certain names elicit certain responses. Apparently they do.
If your statement is true, then what basis can there be for claiming that the employers are racially discriminating, consciously or otherwise?
After all, all we (supposedly) know is that certain names get fewer callbacks than other names. This tells us that employers discriminate on the basis of name. If you name is Cletus William Smith, you might want to change that to "C. William Smith" on your resume.
Posted by: Dan on April 13, 2007 2:22 PMI think most people don't consider teachers to have "government" jobs. We treat public schools as a sui generis form of public employment. I think members of the military are also generally not thought of as "government" workers. I realize this seems illogical but when people think of "government" jobs they generally mean "paper pushers" in the Department of Motor Vehicles or the "welfare" Department, in other words bureaucrats, not soldiers or teachers.
It is certainly conventional wisdom that there are three kinds of government workers: 1.Lazy 2.Stupid and 3.Stupid and Lazy.
Posted by: Bob from Ohio on April 13, 2007 2:27 PMYou guys, all of you, every single one of you is colorblind. You only see things in terms of black and white (and possibly Hispanic). :)
I don't understand black culture at all. From what I see and hear, with the exception of a few dissenting voices, black culture is either about bling, sex, or whining about racism. What about education? Or civility? Or politeness?
At a local (highly affluent) high school recently the principal in a letter to the parents had to apologize for calling a school-fight (that appeared on the Washington Post) "black on black violence".
The problem with the apology though was that the princiapl was originally right. The fight was black-on-black violence. The people in the fight came from an affluent black community in the school district. No one else, Asians or whites, participated. The principal was forced to apologize for telling the truth. What sort of message do you think that would send to the other kids, predominantly Asian and White, who go to that school? After this incident are they going to think "oh, we shouldn't be racist"? Or will they instead recieve an entirely different message (Such as: black teenagers suck, but we're not allowed to say that out loud)?
Posted by: Zhong Lu on April 14, 2007 9:27 PMPeople, people, people. C'mon.
Do we really need more studies to determine that a person's name influences how that person is received or perceived by others?
Have we exiled all memories of grade school playgrounds from our brains? You know, the teasing of others for having funny names, or initials that spelled something naughty.
Yeah, we're older and should be more mature, but we still react differently to the different, its human nature.
Parents need to understand that naming a child is one of the most important decisions they will ever make, but thankfully, the rules are pretty simple.
1) Never give your child a name that will get him/her beat up on the playground. They may still get beat up, but at least it won't be for having a funky name.
2) Never give your child a name that will lead to constant ridicule, such as Candi Seamen. Yes, I'm sure the high school years were absolute hell.
3) Make sure your child's initials do not spell anything naughty, like Peter Isaac Simpson (PIS) or Ashley Sarah Smith (ASS).
4) Never give your daughters cutesy names that end in "i" like Toni, or Candi, or Juli, or Tami, unless you want them to grow up to be blonde bimbos with an IQ of 12. And no, I don't have any studies to support this one, just 40 years of personal observations.
Parents are told to take deep breaths and count to 10 before disciplining unruly children. I would recommend thinking long and hard about the long-term consequences of giving your child a funky name before filling out that birth certificate, if for no other reason than we don't need to be spending government research dollars on these types of studies!
Posted by: dogwood on April 15, 2007 12:35 AMI think you are coming closer to my position, then.
Never was terribly far from it. But you've evidently got some time weighing a bit heavily on your hands and a mood to argue, and here we are.
Posted by: anony-mouse on April 15, 2007 2:38 AMJane
'I hope we can all agree that working for the government shouldn't be one's life long ambition'.
So are we including in this:
- those who join the military, with the goal of defending their country? Most of the top military jobs (warrant officers, lieutenant colonels and above etc.) are only given to 'lifers'
- firemen?
- policemen?
- National Security Councillor?
- CIA Agent?
- work for the National Parks Service, conserving threatened species and protecting America's natural heritage for future generations?
- seeking to become an Ambassador or Deputy Ambassador to a foreign country (in most nations, if not the US, such jobs are of extreme sensitivity, and are given only to people who have spent decades as diplomats-- I realise the US uses more of a patronage system, which accounts for some of the amazing gaffes of its ambassadors. You can't imagine Denmark, say, or Great Britain, putting a political hack into Washington).
Not coincidentally, perhaps, the best channel for upward mobility for blacks in American life has been the Army. Even into the 1980s and 1990s, the Army was the only place in American society where you saw large numbers of white people taking orders from senior black officers and NCOs. More than any other institution in American society, the Army is truly colour blind.
President Truman, by integrating the Army (against vocal opposition in society and Congress) and Presidents Ford and Carter, amongst others, by enforcing anti-racism, have made the US Army into the most successful institution for black social progress ever created.
So it might well be someone's life ambition to serve their country?
Posted by: Valuethinker on April 15, 2007 3:54 PMDogwood: One of my classmates in elementary school went by "BJ". He was diabetic and tiny. In 5th or 6th grade, during recess one of the larger boys in the class once speculated aloud as to what the initials might stand for - and BJ thoroughly whipped him...
Posted by: markm on April 16, 2007 7:40 PMDon't surf here often, for a few reasons, but this post was good. Hope you are doing well.
Posted by: scott on April 19, 2007 12:05 AM