Unintended Effects of Anonymous Résumés
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Abstract
We evaluate an experimental program in which the French public employment service anonymized résumés for firms that were hiring. Firms were free to participate or not; participating firms were then randomly assigned to receive either anonymous résumés or name-bearing ones. We find that participating firms become less likely to interview and hire minority candidates when receiving anonymous résumés. We show how these unexpected results can be explained by the self-selection of firms into the program and by the fact that anonymization prevents the attenuation of negative signals when the candidate belongs to a minority. (JEL J15, J68, J71)Citation
Behaghel, Luc, Bruno Crépon, and Thomas Le Barbanchon. 2015. "Unintended Effects of Anonymous Résumés." American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 7 (3): 1-27. DOI: 10.1257/app.20140185Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- J15 Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
- J68 Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies: Public Policy
- J71 Labor Discrimination
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