Employers most likely to reject transgender people applicants

Employers more often opt out of job applications from transgender people and it's worst is in male-dominated occupations.

Transgender people also seem to be discriminated against on the basis of two different grounds for discrimination. This is shown by a study from Linköping University published in the scientific journal Labor Economics.

Since 2017, gender identity and gender expression has been one of the seven grounds of discrimination in the Swedish Discrimination Act. However, transgender people, ie people who identify with a different gender than the one they were assigned at birth, often state that they are exposed to discrimination in working life. Economics researchers at Linköping University have now verified that this is the case. Their study is the first to prove this with an experimental method.

From an economic perspective, it is interesting to ask why employers do not take advantage of these people’s knowledge. Then we wanted to find out on what grounds transgender people are discriminated against because they fall under two grounds of discrimination in the legislation, the one on gender and the one on gender identity and gender expression. We wanted to investigate on which of the grounds employers discriminate, says Mark Granberg, doctoral student in economics at Linköping University.

He has carried out the study together with Ali Ahmed, professor of economics and Per A. Andersson, doctoral student in psychology.

Previous studies show that transgender people experience discrimination in different ways in working life. In a U.S study from 2011, half of the trans people in the study state that they have been subjected to harassment at work, among other things. However, there has been a lack of experimental studies on discrimination against transgender people in the labor market, which are not based on self-reported experiences.

Discrimination most clearly in male-dominated professions

The study is the first of its kind to examine employers’ discrimination against transgender people, through a so-called correspondence test. It is a common method when examining discrimination and means that test persons do not appear before the employer but send written applications. The researchers from Linköping University sent 2224 fictitious applications for low-skilled jobs that were in the employment service’s job bank. The applications stated that the applicant had made a name change during his lifetime, in some cases from male names to male names, for example Erik to Simon, in other cases the names exceeded the gender boundaries, such as that Erik became Amanda. For each application, the researchers then noted whether the applicants received an answer and, if so, which.

The results show, among other things, that it was 18 percent more likely that a cis person, a person who identifies with the gender they were assigned at birth, received a positive response from employers to their submitted applications, compared to a trans person.

The results also show differences between female- and male-dominated occupations. With regard to positive responses to job applications, it was found that the largest differences between cis and trans people were in the male-dominated professions. Cis men received a positive response from employers in 44 percent of cases, compared with trans women who received a positive response in 24 percent of cases. In the male-dominated professions, cis men thus received almost twice as many positive responses from employers as trans women.

In the female-dominated professions, the discrimination seemed to be mainly due to the gender with which the applicant identified at the time of application. In occupations where about as many men as women work, the researchers saw no statistically significant differences between the different applicants.

The study shows that the legislation is not enough to protect this group in the labor market. It also shows that employers discriminate on different grounds. For example, it is likely that a trans man is discriminated against for being trans in male-dominated professions, while the same person would probably be discriminated against for being a man in female-dominated professions, says Mark Granberg at Linköping University.

The study was partly funded by funds from the Swedish Research Council.