Business Commons^™

Myth: Hard Work And Credentials Determine Employment Opportunities

Alev Dudek

[Review Of The Book Discrimination In Labor Markets], Ronald G. Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] In sum, I consider Discrimination in Labor Markets a fine volume. Anyone who has the slightest interest in the analysis of labor-market discrimination should seriously contemplate purchasing it. The relatively nontechnical nature of the papers will appeal to a wide range of readers, and the book should quickly find its way onto reading lists for undergraduate and graduate courses that discuss the economics of discrimination.

The Latino Immigrant Labor Experience As Depicted In Film, Duane Wright

Duane E Wright II

The author argues that traditional macro-level methods of gathering data on populations create an impersonal depiction of the group. A useful pedagogical tool for teachers to counter this is to use fictional accounts in film and literature to put a more human face on the subjects being studied. Two films, Bread and Roses and El Norte, are used in this way to enhance or add another dimension to studies of the labor experience of Latino immigrants in the United States. The films are looked at through various sociological theories, Assimilation, Competition, and Neo-Marxist. The author concludes that Neo-Marxist theory best …

Escaping From Poverty: Household Income Dynamics In Indonesia, South Africa, Spain, And Venezuela, Gary S. Fields, Paul L. Cichello, Samuel Freije, Marta Menéndez, David Newhouse

Gary S Fields

[Excerpt] This study presents the main results of a larger, more technical report (Fields and others 2001) and subsequent work (Fields and others 2002) that analyzes income mobility in Indonesia, South Africa, Spain, and Venezuela. These economies were selected on the basis of the availability of panel data with which to analyze household income dynamics in the 1990s. By following households over time, we are able to investigate how households that were poor initially fared economically, relative to their richer counterparts. We can learn more about how and why households exit—and enter—poverty. To gauge income mobility, this study centers on …

Men's And Women's Definitions Of "Good" Jobs: Similarities And Differences By Age And Across Time, Pamela S. Tolbert, Phyllis Moen

Pamela S Tolbert

Whether and to what extent men and women hold differing preferences for particular job attributes remains the subject of debate, with a sizable number of empirical studies producing conflicting results. These conflicts may have temporal sources—historical changes in men's and women's preferences for particular job attributes, as well as changes in preferences that commonly occur over individuals' life cycle. Most previous research has neglected the effects of time on gender differences. Using data from national surveys of workers over a 22-year period, this study focuses explicitly on changes by age over time in men's and women's preferences for five key …

Effects Of Disability, Gender, And Level Of Supervision On Ratings Of Job Applicants, Bradford S. Bell, Katherine J. Klein

Bradford S Bell

Using ratings of hypothetical job applicants with and without a disability obtained from both fulltime workers (n = 88) and undergraduates (n = 98), we examined the effects of disability (paraplegia, epilepsy, clinical depression, or non-disabled), gender, and nature of the job (supervisory or non-supervisory) on five job-relevant dependent measures. Contrary to our hypothesis, applicants with a disability were rated significantly higher in activity and potency than applicants without a disability. Further, also contrary to our predictions, gender and job type did not moderate the relationship between disability and applicant ratings. Post-hoc analyses revealed a significant gender by job type …