We study discrimination in hiring and its associated outcomes for the discriminators using a unique survey of Egyptian businesses. Discrimination against women is widespread and overt: about half (51%) of establishments directly admit that they prefer to hire men. The share varies widely across industries, from 60% in retail to only 16% in IT. Using a list randomization technique, we can rule out that discrimination against women is heavily stigmatized in Egypt, meaning that establishments are willing to admit it openly. We then provide novel suggestive evidence showing that discriminating against women is associated the employment of lower-quality workers. We also provide guidance on the use of the list randomization technique and how to interpret it in settings with limited stigma.
We use cookies to provide you with an optimal website experience. This includes cookies that are necessary for the operation of the site as well as cookies that are only used for anonymous statistical purposes, for comfort settings or to display personalized content. You can decide for yourself which categories you want to allow. Please note that based on your settings, you may not be able to use all of the site's functions.
Cookie settings
These necessary cookies are required to activate the core functionality of the website. An opt-out from these technologies is not available.
In order to further improve our offer and our website, we collect anonymous data for statistics and analyses. With the help of these cookies we can, for example, determine the number of visitors and the effect of certain pages on our website and optimize our content.