Legal cases are won or lost on the basis of statistical discrimination measures, but workers’ perceptions of discriminatory behavior are important for understanding labor supply decisions. Workers who believe that they have been discriminated against are more likely to leave their employers,...

This paper investigates the role of psychosocial traits in the occupational segregation of young workers entering the U.S. labor market. We find entry into male-dominated fields of study and male-dominated occupations are both related to the extent to which individuals have “masculine”...

Census data for 1990/91 indicate that Australian and Canadian immigrants have higher levels of English fluency, education, and income (relative to natives) than do U.S. immigrants. This skill deficit for U.S. immigrants arises primarily because the United States receives a much larger share of...

In a 1996 survey of military personnel, more than 65 percent reported experiencing racially offensive behavior and approximately 1 in 10 reported threatening incidents or career-related racial discrimination. While race clearly matters, there is also diversity in the perceived harassment...

We use the exogenous assignment of Army personnel to duty locations to analyze the relationship between the characteristics of local markets and the propensity for consumers to be subjected to racial discrimination in their everyday commercial transactions. Overall, one in eight soldiers report...

This paper contributes to the emerging literature on racial and ethnic tension by analyzing the relationship between local socio-economic conditions and the propensity for outsiders to have threatening racial encounters with insiders. We use unique data for a sample of active-duty Army personnel...

Using a new survey of Canadian job searchers, this paper attempts to measure the effect of employment equity laws on job search outcomes, and on perceptions of discrimination by both men and women. We find some evidence that employment equity coverage in a pre-separation job reduces the relative...

This paper examines the changing nature of attitudes toward and reports of sexual harassment using data for 1978–94 drawn from the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board (USMSPB) of the U.S. federal government. The authors find that although unwanted sexual behavior reported by federal...

Using data from a randomized experiment, we find that having a female teacher lowers the math test scores of female primary school students in disadvantaged neighborhoods. Moreover, we do not find any effect of having a female teacher on male students’ test scores (math or reading) or female...

To understand the issues involved, leading lawyers and economists examine various facets of the child support system from a law and economics perspective. They consider the incentives faced by both custodial and non-custodial parents, and search for policy actions that are more...