Class Advantage, Commitment Penalty: The Gendered Effect of Social Class Signals in an Elite Labor Market

Research on the mechanisms that reproduce social class advantages in the United States focuses primarily on formal schooling and pays less attention to social class discrimination in labor markets. We conducted a résumé audit study to examine the effect of social class signals on entry into large U....

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Published inAmerican sociological review Vol. 81; no. 6; pp. 1097 - 1131
Main Authors Rivera, Lauren A., Tilcsik, András
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.12.2016
American Sociological Association
Subjects
Class
Commitments
Discrimination
Elites
Employment
Females
Hiring
Labor market
Labour market
Law
Law firms
Law schools
Males
Market segmentation
Men
Occupations
Sex discrimination
Sexes
Social Class
Social classes
Stereotypes
United States
Women
United States > US
discrimination
employment
hiring
gender
social class
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Summary:Research on the mechanisms that reproduce social class advantages in the United States focuses primarily on formal schooling and pays less attention to social class discrimination in labor markets. We conducted a résumé audit study to examine the effect of social class signals on entry into large U.S. law firms. We sent applications from fictitious students at selective but non-elite law schools to 316 law firm offices in 14 cities, randomly assigning signals of social class background and gender to otherwise identical résumés. Higher-class male applicants received significantly more callbacks than did higher-class women, lowerclass women, and lower-class men. A survey experiment and interviews with lawyers at large firms suggest that, relative to lower-class applicants, higher-class candidates are seen as better fits with the elite culture and clientele of large law firms. But, although higher-class men receive a corresponding overall boost in evaluations, higher-class women do not, because they face a competing, negative stereotype that portrays them as less committed to full-time, intensive careers. This commitment penalty faced by higher-class women offsets class-based advantages these applicants may receive in evaluations. Consequently, signals of higher-class origin provide an advantage for men but not for women in this elite labor market.
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ISSN:0003-1224
1939-8271
DOI:10.1177/0003122416668154