To what extent is the underrepresentation of ethnic minorities in politics due to ethnic bias? While this question has interested researchers for a long time, direct evidence of ethnic bias in party-controlled nomination processes is scarce. We conducted survey experiments with politicians and voters in Norway, where parties control the nomination process, to examine bias against ethnic minority candidates. The politicians evaluated candidate profiles with randomly assigned information about the candidates’ ethnic backgrounds. Contrary to our expectations, we find that ethnic minority candidates receive higher quality scores and better rankings than ethnic majority candidates. However, the results of a list experiment with voters show that a substantial share of right-wing voters has reservations against voting for a party list with many ethnic minority candidates. Consequently, our study suggests that while the political elite wants ethnically diverse party lists, for some parties, such lists might have an electoral cost.

The potential for peer pressure at the workplace is high since social interactions are frequent and we care about our social standing at work. Peer effects in politics at the workplace are important to understand since workplaces are becoming more sorted according to human capital, which implies that workplace peer effects can increase social inequalities in turnout. To quantify peer effects we use population-wide administrative data from Sweden that covers several general elections and allows us to measure the turnout of colleagues. To identify peer effects we use the turnout of colleagues’ family members in earlier elections as an instrumental variable, and leverage the richness of the data to assess assumptions, improve interpretation, and study heterogeneity. Our estimates suggest that workplace peer effects contribute to social inequality in turnout.

Background: Studies investigating sex disparities related to treatment and outcome of in-hospital cardiac arrest (IHCA) have produced divergent findings and have typically been unable to adjust for outstanding confounding variables.

Objectives: The aim was to examine sex differences in treatment and survival following IHCA, using a comprehensive set of control variables including e.g., age, comorbidity, and patient-level socioeconomic status. Methods: This retrospective study was based on data from the Swedish Register of Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation and Statistics Sweden. In the primary analyses, logistic regression models and ordinary least square regressions were estimated.

Results: The study included 24,217 patients and the majority (70.4%) were men. In the unadjusted analyses, women had a lower chance of survival after cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) attempt, at hospital discharge (with good neurological function) and at 30 days (p<0.01). In the adjusted regression models, female sex was associated with a higher chance of survival after the CPR attempt (B = 1.09, p<0.01) and at 30-days (B = 1.09, p<0.05). In contrast, there was no significant association between sex and survival to discharge with good neurological outcome. Except for treatment duration (B=-0.07, p<0.01), no significant associations between sex and treatment were identified.

Conclusions: No signs of treatment disparities or discrimination related to sex were identified. However, women had a better chance of surviving IHCA compared to men. The finding that women went from having a survival disadvantage (unadjusted analysis) to a survival advantage (adjusted analysis) attests to the importance of including a comprehensive set of control variables, when examining sex differences.

We investigate if employers avoid hiring workers living in neighborhoods with low socioeconomic status and/or with long commuting times. In a large-scale field experiment in the Swedish labor market, we sent more than 4,000 fictitious resumes, with randomly assigned information about the applicants’ residential locations, to firms with advertised vacancies. Our findings show that commuting time has a negative effect on the likelihood of being contacted by an employer, while the socioeconomic status of a neighborhood does not appear to be important. These results offer guidance for policymakers responsible for reversing segregation patterns.

Purpose Many organisations monitor statistics on the background of job applicants to inform diversity management, a practice known as equality monitoring (EM). The study examines perceptions of EM and employers that use it. Additionally, it aims to assess potentially salient group differences in attitudes towards EM, focussing on perceived history of employment discrimination, ethnicity, sex, and a comparison between the UK and Sweden - two countries which differ extensively in EM prevalence. Design/methodology/approach A cross-sectional self-report survey assessed attitudes toward EM, attraction to employers using it, pro-equality and diversity attitudes, perceived history of employment discrimination and background characteristics (e.g. ethnicity and sex), and compared a UK and Sweden sample (N = 925). Findings The results reveal positive perceptions of EM overall. Although no differences were observed between UK ethnic majority and minority respondents, White British men rate employers using EM as less attractive with increasing levels of perceived past discrimination. Women have more positive perceptions than men. Finally, the UK sample rated EM more positively than the Sweden sample. Originality/value Despite EM being widespread, the study is the first to investigate detailed perceptions of it, making group and country comparisons. Results support the use of EM in HRM but highlight the need for clear communication to avoid confusion with positive discrimination, which is perceived negatively in some majority group members, and to allay fears of data misuse. Recommendations are made for future implementation.

Labor markets in advanced economies have undergone substantial change in recentdecades due to globalization, technological improvements, and organizational changes. Due tothese developments, oral and written language skills have become increasingly important evenin less skilled jobs. Immigrants – who often have limited skills in the host country languageupon arrival – are likely to be particularly affected by the increase in language requirements.Despite this increase in literacy requirements, little is known about how immigrants’ languageproficiency is rewarded in the labor market. However, estimating the causal effect ofimmigrants’ language skills on hiring is challenging due to potential biases caused by omittedvariables, reverse causality, and measurement error.To address identification problems, we conduct a large-scale field experiment, where wesend thousands of fictitious resumes to employers with a job opening. With the help of aprofessional linguist, we manipulate the cover letters by introducing common second-languagefeatures, which makes the resumes reflect variation in the language skills of real-worldmigrants. Our findings show that better language proficiency in the cover letter has a strongpositive effect on the callback rate for a job interview: moving from the lowest level of languageproficiency to a level similar to natives almost doubles the callback rate. Consistent with therecent development that language proficiency is also important for many low- and mediumskilledjobs, the effect of better language skills does not vary across the vastly different typesof occupations we study. Finally, the results from employer surveys suggest that it is improvedlanguage skills per se that is the dominant explanation behind the language proficiency effect,rather than language skills acting as a proxy for other unobserved abilities or characteristics.

We investigate how social gender norms influence parental leave uptake intentions by conducting two separate survey experiments on prospective fathers (N = 877) and mothers (N = 882) in the UK. In a between-subjects design, we manipulate social gender norms by varying information on the average number of days that other fathers and mothers stay at home to take care of a child during the first year after childbirth. We find that when prospective parents (both genders) are exposed to the low staying-home-with-children norm, they plan less parental leave uptake compared to the control (no norm) group. When exposed to the high staying-home-with-children norm, men (but not women) plan more parental leave uptake compared to the control group. We discuss policy implications and suggest directions for future studies.

Prior research suggests that job search activities of underrepresented groups are sensitive to diversity cues in recruitment materials, but less is known about the impact of different types of cues. Despite widespread use, employment equality monitoring (EM), or data collection on legally protected characteristics (like gender or ethnic background), has received scant empirical attention. Two experiments used fictitious job advertisements to examine the effects of a strong equality/diversity/inclusion (EDI) value statement and descriptions of EM use by employers. In Study 1, we found that advertisements containing an EDI statement and a statement of EM together produced the highest ratings of organizational prestige, and, in minority respondents, stronger job-pursuit intentions. Study 2 examined various framing conditions of EM using a between-subjects design. The inclusion of any EDI information was positively received, but minority ethnicity respondents were less positive when an EM statement was provided without an explanation for why it is done. The practical implications are that both value statements and EM information together could help increase attraction among jobseekers from underrepresented groups, with potential to contribute to diversity branding. However, minority groups are still sceptical of employer EDI credibility and employers must do more than talk the talk.

This paper investigates coworker peer effects in parental leave usage in Sweden. Weuse an instrumental variable approach labeled peers of peers in which parental leave usage byfamily peers (siblings and cousins) of coworkers is used as an instrument for coworkers’parental leave usage. For fathers, we find that a 10-day increase in average parental leave usageamong coworkers increases usage by approximately one and a half days, while for mothers,the increase is approximately one day. The results are robust to alternative model specifications.We explore possible mechanisms and discuss policy implications.