@article {9621, title = {Do State Laws Protecting Older Workers from Discrimination Reduce Age Discrimination in Hiring? Experimental (and Nonexperimental) Evidence}, number = {WP 2017-360}, year = {2017}, pages = {1-79}, institution = {Michigan Retirement Research Center}, address = {Ann Arbor, MI}, abstract = {We provide evidence from a field experiment {\textemdash} a correspondence study {\textemdash} on age discrimination in hiring for retail sales jobs. We collect experimental data in all 50 states and then relate measured age discrimination {\textemdash} the difference in callback rates between old and young applicants {\textemdash} to variation across states in antidiscrimination laws offering protections to older workers that are stronger than the federal age and disability discrimination laws. We do a similar analysis for nonexperimental data on differences across states in hiring rates of older versus younger workers. The experimental evidence points consistently to evidence of hiring discrimination against older men and, more so, against older women. However, the evidence on the relationship between hiring discrimination against older workers and state variation in age and disability discrimination laws is not so clear; at a minimum, there is not a compelling case that stronger state protections reduce hiring discrimination against older workers. In contrast, the non-experimental evidence suggests that stronger disability discrimination protections increase the relative hiring of older workers.}, keywords = {Ageism, Discrimination, Labor force participation}, url = {http://www.mrrc.isr.umich.edu/publications/papers/pdf/wp360.pdf}, author = {David Neumark and Ian Burn and Patrick Button and Nanneh Chehras} } @article {8635, title = {Does Protecting Older Workers from Discrimination Make It Harder to Get Hired? Evidence from Disability Discrimination Laws}, journal = {National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series}, volume = {No. 21379}, year = {2015}, month = {2015}, abstract = {We explore the effects of disability discrimination laws on hiring of older workers. A concern with anti-discrimination laws is that they may reduce hiring by raising the cost of terminations and {\textendash} in the specific case of disability discrimination laws {\textendash} raising the cost of employment because of the need to accommodate disabled workers. Moreover, disability discrimination laws can affect non-disabled older workers because they are fairly likely to develop work-related disabilities, yet are not protected by these laws. Using state variation in disability discrimination protections, we find little or no evidence that stronger disability discrimination laws lower the hiring of non-disabled older workers. We similarly find no evidence of adverse effects of disability discrimination laws on hiring of disabled older workers.}, keywords = {Ageism, Aging Workforce, Bridge employment, Disabilities, Older Adults}, url = {http://www.nber.org/papers/w21379}, author = {David Neumark and Joanne Song and Patrick Button} }