Labor market discrimination in Delhi: Evidence from a field experiment

Abstract

We study the role of caste and religion in India s new economy sectors software and call- centers by sending 3160 ctitious resumes in response to 371 job openings in and around Delhi (India) that were advertised in major city papers and online job sites. We randomly allocate caste-linked surnames across resumes in order to isolate the e¤ect of caste on appli- cants job-search outcomes. We nd no evidence of discrimination against non-upper-caste (i.e. Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, and Other Backward Caste) applicants for software jobs. We do nd larger and signi cant di¤erences between callback rates for upper-castes and Other Backward Castes (and to a lesser extent Scheduled Castes) in the case of call-center jobs. There is no evidence of discrimination against Muslims for either of the two kinds of jobs we apply for. Overall, the evidence suggests that applicants caste identities do not signi cantly a¤ect the callback decisions of rms in these rapidly-growing sectors of the Indian economy