Discrimination in recruitment against people of presumed North African origin: what lessons can be learnt from a major Testing study?

Breda, Thomas; Laouénan, Morgane; Safi, Mirna; Sultan Parraud, Joyce; Jacquemet, Nicolas; Rathelot, Roland

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Discrimination in recruitment against people of presumed North African origin: what lessons can be learnt from a major Testing study?

Thomas Breda, Morgane Laouénan, Mirna Safi, Joyce Sultan Parraud, Nicolas Jacquemet, Roland Rathelot

November 2021

The study carried out by ISM Corum and The Institut des politiques publiques (IPP) under the auspices of Dares measures discrimination in recruitment against people of presumed North African origin across a range of different occupations and highlights any differences according to various segments of the labour market and candidate profiles.

Reference IPP Policy Brief No. 76

Quote this publication

Dares-MAR, IPP, ISM Corum (November 2021). ‘Discrimination in the recruitment of people of presumed Maghrebi origin’, IPP Policy Brief, No. 76. The Institut des politiques publiques.

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Presentation

Numerous studies show that French people of North African descent face significant difficulties in the labour market, right from the very first stage of the recruitment process. The results of recent, large-scale Testing confirm this. Discrimination in recruitment based on perceived origin remains high and is a major factor in the French labour market. On average, when candidates are of comparable quality, those whose identities suggest a North African background are 31.5 per cent less likely to be contacted by Recruiters than those with first names and surnames of French origin. Whilst discrimination based on presumed origin is significant and persistent, it is less pronounced – though not entirely absent – amongst the most highly qualified employees. These results do not vary significantly between women and men.

Key Results

9,600 applications were submitted in response to 2,400 job offers advertised across 11 different occupational categories. The gender and identity (first name and surname) of the applicants were randomly assigned in order to measure discrimination in recruitment based on gender and presumed origin.
To receive the same number of positive responses, a person with a first name and surname that sound North African must submit, on average, 1.5 times as many applications as a person with the same profile but whose first name and surname sound French.
Discrimination is around twice as prevalent in low-skilled occupations compared with that observed in skilled occupations.
Discrimination based on perceived origin affects both male and female applicants alike and varies little according to gender, regardless of the family status indicated on the application.