https://blackgirlnerds.com/name-discrimination-in-2024-how-bias-still-affects-job-applications/

Dwight Jackson, a 27-year-old Detroit resident, has filed a lawsuit against the Shinola Hotel — a part of the Shinola brand, known for its high-quality watches, bicycles, and leather goods and synonymous with stylish design and luxurious accommodations. Jackson’s lawsuit alleges racial discrimination in Shinola Hotel’s hiring practices, claiming that, despite having extensive experience in the hospitality industry, his application to the hotel was ignored until he reapplied under a different name.

In April 2024, Jackson reapplied again, this time under the name John Jebrowski, which he chose because he felt it sounded more traditionally white. Apart from the name, the only thing that has been changed on Dwight Jackson’s resume is the date. This time, however, he received a callback for an interview in a rather short timeframe. In fact, he was offered multiple interviews within the same week, helping Jackson establish that Shinola’s consideration of candidates was based on the racial appearance of the applicant’s name.

Shortly after receiving a call, Mr. Jackson attended the job interview and confronted the interviewer at Shinola Hotel, revealing his true identity and expressing his belief that he was not given an interview initially because his name appeared more traditionally African American. And that’s despite the fact that he previously worked at David Whitney Hotel and Marriot Western Book Cadillac — both of which are described as luxurious accommodations — and that he was equally qualified as John Jebrowski, primarily because they are the same person.

It’s quite obvious that Dwight Jackson applied for a job he was eminently qualified for. Assuming that the allegations are true and Shinola did deny Jackson an opportunity for a job interview, the hotel is then in clear violation of the Michigan Elliot-Larsen Civil Rights Act, which protects individuals from discrimination in employment, housing, education, and public accommodations in the state of Michigan. Shortly after Dwight Jackson confronted the interviewer and underwent the interview process, he was informed that he was no longer a viable candidate for the position.

It’s important to note that Dwight Jackson’s case is still a developing story and, sadly, not an isolated case — not in the Shinola Hotel, Detroit, or Michigan. Names are often the very first thing we learn about someone, and they often influence first impressions, as revealed by numerous studies conducted between 2004 and 2022. According to a study published in the American Economic Review, employers are 50% more likely to call back applications with stereotypically white names like Greg or Emily versus applications with names like Lakisha or Jamal.

The study focused on race in the labor market by sending fictitious resumes to help-wanted ads found in Chicago and Boston newspapers. The researchers, Marianne Bertrand and Sendhil Mullainathan, sent resumes, which were randomly assigned African-American- or white-sounding names. They found that fictitious candidates with white-sounding names received more than 50% more callbacks for interviews. Furthermore, the racial gap is uniform across occupation, industry, and employer size, indicating that the differential treatment by race appears to still be prominent in the US labor market.

Another study, co-authored by Assistant Professor of Economics Martin Abel and his fellow economist Rulof Burger, found employers are less likely to call back job applicants with Black-sounding names when presented with identical resumes. However, this study was much larger in size, which allowed researchers to use nationally representative data. Namely, Abel and Burger recruited a group of 1,500 people from across the United States who were nationally representative in terms of race, ethnicity, age, and gender.

Then, they collected the data regarding the test group’s attitudes towards the race, ethnicity, education, and productivity they would associate with the names selected from a pool of 2,400 workers of various ethnicities who have been previously hired for a particular task or position. The study showed that, after being presented with pairs of names, participating employers would favor job candidates whose names were traditionally white. In fact, the chance they would choose such a candidate was almost twice as high compared to Black candidates.

The study also showed that the tendency to discriminate against candidates with Black-sounding names was most prominent among men, people over 55, white people, and conservatives. The researchers also found that the name discrimination only increased when participants were put under time pressure. But why is that so? According to Martin Abel, the names of workers who were perceived as Black were most likely to elicit negative presumptions, such as being less educated, less productive, and less reliable compared to candidates with white-sounding names.

So, how do we, as a society, address this issue? Other studies have suggested that once employers learn more about potential applications, the discriminatory influence carried by the person’s name begins to fade. This means that given enough time and details, employers will, in general, base their decision on the applicant’s experience and performance. The only issue is that racial biases prevent the necessary interactions that would make the very same biases disappear.

Senior lecturer in cross-cultural management at King’s College London, Mladen Adamovic — who participated in a separate study conducted by Monash University and King’s College London — suggested a solution that could potentially reduce racial bias in the labor market, not just in the United States but all around the world where such issues are present. He suggested that employers should keep the names of applicants anonymous, implement standardized recruitment procedures, provide additional training for recruiters, and improve diversity management.

Name discrimination and unconscious (and even conscious) bias are still big problems plaguing our society; changing names shouldn’t be something people have to resort to get their foot in the door, not after they’ve invested the time and money in their education and/or after years of experience in a particular field, which makes them equally as competent (if not more so) than the next white person applying for the same position.