stICKY STEREOTYPES

co-authored with DR. EMMA RACKSTRAW

In a large online experiment with a nationally representative sample of 3,000 Prolific workers we hire to act as recruiters, we show that posterior beliefs about productivity differences are affected by their supervisor’s race. We find that recruiters assigned a Black supervisor evaluate Black job seekers as more productive than recruiters assigned a White supervisor,a supervisor of unknown race, or no supervisor). On the contrary, the estimated productivity of white jobseekers is largely unaffected by the race of their supervisor. Altogether, our study examines how the dual role of observability and racial salience can potentially be used to reduce hiring discrimination against Black jobseekers. We show that the presence of a Black supervisor may shift how Black jobseekers are evaluated by recruiters. contributes to our understanding of how monitoring and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) efforts may counter biased decision-making in the workplace and reduce hiring discrimination against Black jobseekers.