TY - JOUR
T1 - Gender-targeted job ads in the recruitment process
T2 - Facts from a Chinese job board
AU - Kuhn, Peter
AU - Shen, Kailing
AU - Zhang, Shuo
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2020/11
Y1 - 2020/11
N2 - We study how explicit employer requests for applicants of a particular gender enter the recruitment process on a Chinese job board, focusing on two questions: First, to what extent do employers’ requests affect the gender mix of a firm's applicant pool? Second, how ‘hard’ are employers’ stated gender requests– are they essential requirements, soft preferences, or something in between? Using internal data from a Chinese job board, we estimate that an explicit request for men raises men's share in the applicant pool by 14.6 percentage points, or 26.4%; requests for women raises the female applicant share by 24.6 percentage points, or 55.0%. Men (women) who apply to gender-mismatched jobs also experience a substantial call-back penalty of 24 (43) percent. Thus, explicit gender requests do shape applicant pools, and signal a substantial but not absolute preference for the requested gender.
AB - We study how explicit employer requests for applicants of a particular gender enter the recruitment process on a Chinese job board, focusing on two questions: First, to what extent do employers’ requests affect the gender mix of a firm's applicant pool? Second, how ‘hard’ are employers’ stated gender requests– are they essential requirements, soft preferences, or something in between? Using internal data from a Chinese job board, we estimate that an explicit request for men raises men's share in the applicant pool by 14.6 percentage points, or 26.4%; requests for women raises the female applicant share by 24.6 percentage points, or 55.0%. Men (women) who apply to gender-mismatched jobs also experience a substantial call-back penalty of 24 (43) percent. Thus, explicit gender requests do shape applicant pools, and signal a substantial but not absolute preference for the requested gender.
KW - China
KW - Discrimination
KW - Gender
KW - Job board
KW - Search
KW - Segregation
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85089741141&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2020.102531
DO - 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2020.102531
M3 - Article
SN - 0304-3878
VL - 147
JO - Journal of Development Economics
JF - Journal of Development Economics
M1 - 102531
ER -