Browsing by Subject "Hiring practices"

Now showing 1 - 3 of 3

A Legal, political, and economic analysis of Ban the Box hiring practices
(2015-12) Lopez, Patrick J; Angel, Jacqueline Lowe; Deitch, Michele
More than 70 million American adults have some sort of criminal record, and more than 600,000 people are released from incarceration each year. Because many employers harbor concerns regarding workplace safety, productivity, and exposure to liability, individuals who were formerly incarcerated experience great difficulty in securing employment after they are released from jail or prison. The accompanying decrease in wages has negative economic consequences for those individuals, their families, and the community at large. The disproportionate representation of men of color in the justice system implicates civil rights and social justice questions. What’s more, because many employers over-estimate the risk of hiring individuals who were formerly incarcerated, businesses nationwide regularly fail to hire the most qualified candidates for job openings. This report examines legal protections afforded to people released from incarceration and the current efforts of public employers, primarily at the city and county levels, to reform their hiring practices with the goal of employing a greater number of qualified people with criminal records. The report also includes a brief discussion of the role that prominent private employers have played in shaping this policy debate. An analysis of the impact of modifying hiring practices would have on individuals formerly incarcerated, private employers, tax collections, government spending, and quality of life indicators suggests positive but modest effects. These findings indicate that enacting Ban the Box and fair chance hiring practices would be beneficial to people formerly incarcerated and their families with no detrimental effect on the vast majority of public and private employers. Moreover, the community would benefit from the positive effects flowing from an expected decrease in recidivism.
Exploring factors that influence gender-based preferences in hiring decisions : a survey experiment
(2015-08) Rosen, Thomas Weston; Pedulla, David S.; Rose, Mary
A persistent and pressing area of sociological concern is exploring how, where, and against whom discrimination occurs in labor markets. Competing theories attempt to explain how a hirer or decision maker’s gender relates to their preference for particular applicants. Homophily perspectives predict an in-group bias in which male hirers prefer male applicants and female hirers prefer female applicants. In contrast, Status Characteristics Theory suggests that the status associated with the applicant will motivate a hirer's views, which in the context of the labor market predicts male applicants receiving a preference from both female and male hirers. This study contributes to the theoretical debate on labor market decision-making by exploring how decision makers in the workforce respond to applications that vary on the basis of gender and recent employment history (i.e. whether or not the applicant is unemployed at the time of application submission). Employing original survey-experimental data, this study examines the following question: do male and female hirers differ in their preferences for job applicants on the basis of applicant gender? It finds that males and females do differ in their hiring preferences, with female hirers demonstrating an in-group preference for female applicants and that this preference is stronger when the applicant is presently employed and perceived to be competent. These findings suggest that hirer gender and present employment status moderate and that perceptions of applicant competence mediate the relationship between applicant gender and hiring outcomes. Consequently, these are important factors to consider when predicting gender-based labor market outcomes.
Uncovering the black box : the hiring of Black educators for principalship positions in suburban contexts
(2024-05) Clarida, Kimberly Danielle ; DeMatthews, David; Jabbar , Huriya; Green, Terrance L; Williams, Sheneka; Reyes, Pedro
Researchers have long recognized that common hiring practices are racially biased (Avery, 1979; Bertrand & Mullainathan, 2003). However, in education, few studies examine the hiring and placement policies and practices for school principals at the district level (Palmer & Mullooly, 2015). Equitable hiring practices are essential for ensuring equal opportunity for Black educators, who are underrepresented in the principalship despite the increasing number of Black students in K-12 (Williams & Loeb, 2012). The principal representation gap is especially alarming when Black students are consistently disenfranchised within U.S. public schools (Lomotey, 2019). Better educational opportunities for Black students are achievable and tied to hiring racially diverse and equity-focused principals (Bartanen & Grissom, 2019) - specifically Black principals (Kelley, 2012; Lomotey, 2019; Williams & Loeb, 2012). This dissertation uses a mixed method multiple case study design to analyze hiring practices within two suburban school districts through the lens of racialized organizational theory (Ray, 2020). The study starts with investigating the “black box” of districts’ hiring policies and practices using document analysis, hiring observations, and interviews with district officials and employees who participate in principal selection committees. Then, application data is analyzed to identify the rate at which Black candidates apply for principal positions compared to the rates at which they are hired and the demographics of schools where they are placed. Finally, interviews with Black educators in each district were used to understand how hiring policies and practices can improve for principals based on their experiences. This study allows researchers to conceptualize what is happening within the application pool process at the district level and provide school districts with insights on how equitable hiring structures and practices can further promote the hiring of Black principals.