Tall and pale = more money on the job

Wed31Jan2007

Tall and pale = more money on the job

17:20 H | Topics: Immigration - Labor - Race

If you are an immigrant who's tall or light-skinned, you're likely to make more money than your shorter, darker-skinned counterpart, according to research by a professor at Vanderbilt University:

Joni Hersch, a law and economics professor at Vanderbilt University, looked at a government survey of 2,084 legal immigrants to the United States from around the world and found that those with the lightest skin earned an average of 8 percent to 15 percent more than similar immigrants with much darker skin.

"On average, being one shade lighter has about the same effect as having an additional year of education," Hersch said.

Researchers say that this proves that the issue of employment discrimination among immigrants transcends race or nationality, moving into the muddier area of skin tone and an overall "preference for whiteness":

That means that if two similar immigrants from Bangladesh, for example, came to the United States at the same time, with the same occupation and ability to speak English, the lighter-skinned immigrant would make more money on average.

"I thought that once we controlled for race and nationality, I expected the difference to go away, but even with people from the same country, the same race — skin color really matters," she said, "and height."

Although many cultures show a bias toward lighter skin, Hersch said her analysis shows that the skin-color advantage was not due to preferential treatment for light-skinned people in their country of origin. The bias, she said, occurs in the U.S.

According to AP, the study also showed that an extra inch of height can be associated with an added 1% of income.

The next wave in discrimination suits could very well be based on skin tone rather than race.

Via / MSNBC