Research news: employers discriminate on age at in-person interviews

Strong evidence employers discriminate on age at in-person interviews

Newmark, D. (2020). Age Discrimination in Hiring: Evidence from Age-Blind vs. Non-Age-Blind Hiring Procedures. NBER Working Paper No. 26623, January 2020, JEL No. J14,J7.

https://www.nber.org/papers/w26623.pdf

I study age discrimination in hiring, exploiting a difference between age-revealed and partially age-blind hiring procedures. Under the first hiring procedure, age is revealed simultaneously with other applicant information and job offer rates are much lower for older than for younger job applicants. Under the second hiring procedure, interview selections are based on detailed, age-blind on-line applications, while subsequent interviews are not age-blind. Older applicants are not under-selected for interviews, but after in-person interviews when age is revealed, older applicants still face a much lower job offer rate. This evidence is strongly consistent with age discrimination in hiring.