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Ethnic Discrimination in the Market Place of Small Business Transfers

Author

Listed:
  • Ali M Ahmed

    (Linnaeus University)

  • Lina Andersson

    (Linnaeus University)

  • Mats Hammarstedt

    (Linnaeus University)

Abstract

This paper presents the first field experiment regarding ethnic discrimination in the market place of small business transfers. We let two fictitious prospective buyers, one with a typical Swedish name and one with a typical Arab/Muslim name, respond to advertisements of small business transfers on the Internet in Sweden. We then recorded the number contacts achieved by each fictitious buyer with sellers. We found that sellers discriminated against the buyer with an Arab/Muslim name in the sense that the buyer with an Arab/Muslim name obtained fewer contacts with sellers than did the buyer with a Swedish name.

Suggested Citation

  • Ali M Ahmed & Lina Andersson & Mats Hammarstedt, 2009. "Ethnic Discrimination in the Market Place of Small Business Transfers," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 29(4), pages 3050-3058.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-09-00626
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    9. Marianne Bertrand & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "Are Emily and Greg More Employable Than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 991-1013, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Bird, Miriam & Wennberg, Karl, 2016. "Why family matters: The impact of family resources on immigrant entrepreneurs' exit from entrepreneurship," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 687-704.
    2. Jonas Månsson & Josefin Dahlander, 2011. "Social interaction impact on attitudes – Native Swedes’ attitudes towards labour immigrants and guest workers after hurricane Gudrun," Baltic Journal of Economics, Baltic International Centre for Economic Policy Studies, vol. 11(1), pages 51-64, July.
    3. Souleymane Mbaye, 2019. "Trois évaluations d’actions de lutte contre les discriminations," Erudite Ph.D Dissertations, Erudite, number ph19-01 edited by Pascale Petit.
    4. Zoran Slavnic, 2013. "Immigrant Small Business in Sweden: A Critical Review of the Development of A Research Field," Journal of Business Administration Research, Journal of Business Administration Research, Sciedu Press, vol. 2(1), pages 29-42, April.
    5. Karaarslan, Can, 2021. "Differences in Unemployment due to Sexual Orientation: Evidence from the Swedish Labour Market," Working Papers for Marketing & Management 52, Offenburg University, Department of Media and Information.
    6. Mark Granberg & Niklas Ottosson & Ali Ahmed, 2020. "Do ethnicity and sex of employers affect applicants’ job interest? An experimental exploration," Journal for Labour Market Research, Springer;Institute for Employment Research/ Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), vol. 54(1), pages 1-10, December.
    7. Granberg, Mark & Andersson, Per A. & Ahmed, Ali, 2020. "Hiring Discrimination Against Transgender People: Evidence from a Field Experiment," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    8. Grosskopf, Brit & Pearce, Graeme, 2017. "Discrimination in a deprived neighbourhood: An artefactual field experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 29-42.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Discrimination; self-employment; small business transfers; ethnic minorities; field experiment.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J7 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination
    • C9 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments

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    Access and download statistics

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