Ethnic Discrimination During the Covid-19 pandemic

PublikationBokkapitel
Ali Ahmed

Sammanfattning

Ethnic discrimination is common in labor and housing markets. It leads to lower wages and higher unemployment for ethnic minorities, to segregation in the labor market, and to residential segregation. Several studies show that the Covid-19 pandemic increased the extent of ethnic discrimination. The prejudice against hiring migrants may have increased because people from countries where the epidemic started or from countries with a lower vaccination coverage were blamed for the spread. It may also have increased in the cases where the Covid-19 pandemic led to higher unemployment making it less costly for employers to discriminate.

Ahmed, A., Lundahl, M., & Wadensjö, E. (2023). Ethnic discrimination during the Covid-19 pandemic. In L. Lerpold, Ö. Sjöberg, & K. Wennberg (Eds.), Migration and Integration in a Post-Pandemic World: Socioeconomic Opportunities and Challenges (pp. 291–314). Palgrave Macmillan.


Liknande innehåll

Discrimination as a determinant of economic inequality
BokkapitelPublikation
Ahmed, A., Lundahl, M., & Wadensjö, E.
Publiceringsår

2024

Publicerat i

Inequality: Economic and Social Issues.

Sammanfattning

In ‘Discrimination as a Determinant of Economic Inequality’, Ali Ahmed, Mats Lundahl, and Eskil Wadensjö examine how economic theory can be used to unearth the mechanisms to produce discrimination and inequality, to identify the winners and losers from it, and to construct recipes for the eradication of discrimination. They stress the fact that economics is far from a unified social science and hence the need to apply different theories as different situations call for it. Two notorious cases are examined: the South African apartheid system and the American discrimination of blacks by whites. The chapter ends with an examination of a number of contemporary cases of ethnic discrimination of minorities.

Samhall work experience and employability: A field experiment on disability discrimination in the Swedish labor market
Artikel (med peer review)Publikation
Ahmed, A., Granberg, M., Khalaf, G. A., & Åberg, A.
Publiceringsår

2024

Publicerat i

Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research, 26(1).

Sammanfattning

Employment is vital for the quality of life and societal integration of disabled people, who often encounter barriers. Programs like Sweden’s state-owned company Samhall are designed to level the playing field. Yet, whether discrimination persists after program participation and ample work experience remains an intriguing question. We investigated whether signaling disability through work experience at Samhall affects employability in Sweden for cleaning roles. A field experiment was conducted in which 768 fictitious job applications were sent to employers with vacant cleaner positions in Sweden. Implied disability, indicated by work experience at Samhall, and gender were randomly varied in the applications. The primary outcome metric was positive employer responses. Disabled applicants received fewer positive responses (28%) than non-disabled applicants (34%). Discrimination was more pronounced for disabled male applicants. The study reveals nuanced discrimination against job applicants with disabilities in Sweden, particularly disabled males, despite their extensive training and experience.

A field experiment on ethnic bias in public housing practices in Sweden
Artikel (med peer review)Publikation
Ahmed, A., & Bandick, R.
Publiceringsår

2024

Publicerat i

Housing Studies, 1-21.

Sammanfattning

This paper presents the first study to investigate ethnic differential treatment in public housing through a correspondence test field experiment. The experiment involved sending inquiries from fictitious couples with Swedish or Arabic names to all public housing companies in Sweden. Four outcomes were examined: whether the public housing companies responded to the inquiries, whether they initiated their response with a greeting, whether they had a priority system in place, and whether they provided information about problematic neighborhoods. The findings revealed disparities in the treatment of the couples. The Swedish couple received greetings and information about problematic neighborhoods at a greater rate than the Arab couple. This study contributes to existing literature on ethnic differences in the housing market by providing evidence of differential treatment within the public housing sector. Additionally, it explores the content and quality of public housing companies’ responses, offering valuable insights for policymakers and housing professionals in designing interventions to promote equality and counteract differential treatment.

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