Doris Weichselbaumer

Is it Sex or Personality? The Impact of Sex-Stereotypes on Discrimination in Applicant Selection

This paper investigates whether women have less access to attractive, traditionally male jobs because their sex-stereotypical personality does not fit the job. If women as a group are assumed not to possess the required characteristics for a male occupation, they will not be hired for such jobs. In this study we contrast the labor outcomes of a woman who possesses the required masculine characteristics with those of a traditional female. If a woman can demonstrate that she does not correspond to her sex stereotype and in fact does have the stereotypical personality traits of a man, she should be treated like a man. A woman with identical human capital and personality should be equally productive as a man-no other conceivable variables might determine productivity apart from knowledge and personality traits. Consequently, she should receive equal treatment. If such an equal treatment is not observable, we argue, discrimination has been documented.

Testing for Discrimination Against Lesbians of Different Marital Status: A Field Experiment

In this paper, a correspondence testing experiment is conducted to examine sexual orientation discrimination against lesbians in Germany. Applications for four fictional female characters are sent out in response to job advertisements: a heterosexual single, a married heterosexual, a single lesbian and a lesbian who is in a ‘same-sex registered partnership’. Different results are obtained for the two cities investigated, Munich and Berlin. While single lesbians and lesbians in a registered partnership are equally discriminated in comparison to the heterosexual women in the city of Munich, no discrimination based on sexual orientation has been found in Berlin. Furthermore, for a subset of our data we can compare the effects of a randomized versus a paired testing approach, which suggests that under certain conditions, due to increased conspicuity, the paired testing approach may lead to biased results.

Market Orientation and Gender Wage Gaps: An International Study

Two very different approaches are used to explore the relation between market orientation and gender wage differentials in international data. More market orientation might be related to gender wage gaps via its effects on competition in product and labor markets and the general absence of regulation in the economy. The first approach employs meta-analysis data and takes advantage of the fact that many studies already exist which use national data sources to the best possible extent. The second approach uses comparable micro data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), which allows calculating internationally consistent gender wage residuals in the first place. By comparing these two very different methods of data collection we get a robust result relating higher levels of market orientation as proxied by the Economic Freedom Index with lower gender wage gaps.

Market Orientation and Gender Wage Gaps: an International Study

Two very different approaches are used to explore the relation between market orientation and gender wage differentials in international data. More market orientation might be related to gender wage gaps via its effects on competition in product and labor markets and the general absence of regulation in the economy. The first approach employs meta-analysis data and takes advantage of the fact that many studies already exist which use national data sources to the best possible extent. The second approach uses comparable micro data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), which allows calculating internationally consistent gender wage residuals in the first place. By comparing these two very different methods of data collection we get a robust result relating higher levels of market orientation as proxied by the Economic Freedom Index with lower gender wage gaps.