This article examines the effects of discrimination based on race, ethnic background, nationality, religion, sex, age, disability and sexual orientation on skill underutilization and under-skilling in 30 European countries. People who experienced a variety of forms of workplace discrimination were more likely to report over-skilling, defined as having skills for more demanding roles than required for their job. Paradoxically, some forms of labour market discrimination were also linked to under-skilling, where people report requiring more training to fulfil their job role. The findings are explained in terms of how discrimination in the labour market can have differential impacts on access to career progression and training opportunities across organizations. Differences between self-report and statistical estimates of discrimination are observed. Broader implications for the interpretation of statistical models in discrimination research are discussed.
AleksynskaMTritahA (2013) Occupation–education mismatch of immigrant workers in Europe: context and policies. Economics of Education Review36: 229–244.
3.
AltonjiJGBlankRM (1999) Race and gender in the labor market. Handbook of Labor Economics3: 3143–3259.
4.
AntecolHCobb-ClarkDAHellandE (2014) Bias in the legal profession: self-assessed versus statistical measures of discrimination. The Journal of Legal Studies43(2): 323–357.
5.
AveryDRMcKayPFWilsonDC (2008) What are the odds? How demographic similarity affects the prevalence of perceived employment discrimination. Journal of Applied Psychology93(2): 235–249.
6.
BerletCLyonsMN (2018) Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort. New York: Guilford Publications.
7.
BlankRMDabadyMConstanceC (2004) Measuring Racial Discrimination. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.
8.
BlinderAS (1973) Wage discrimination: reduced form and structural estimates. Journal of Human Resources8(2): 436–455.
9.
Bonilla-SilvaE (1997) Rethinking racism: toward a structural interpretation. American Sociological Review62(3): 465–480.
10.
BrackePPattynEdem KnesebeckO (2013) Overeducation and depressive symptoms: diminishing mental health returns to education. Sociology of Health and Illness35(8): 1242–1259.
11.
BryninMGüveliA (2012) Understanding the ethnic pay gap in Britain. Work, Employment and Society26(4): 574–587.
12.
CastillaEJ (2008) Gender, race, and meritocracy in organizational careers. American Journal of Sociology113(6): 1479–1526.
13.
ChiswickBRMillerPW (2009) The international transferability of immigrants’ human capital. Economics of Education Review28(2): 162–169.
14.
ConnorHTyersCModoodT, et al (2004) Why the difference? A closer look at higher education minority ethnic students and graduates. Research Report 552. Brighton: Institute for Employment Studies.
15.
CrenshawKW (1988) Race, reform, and retrenchment: transformation and legitimation in antidiscrimination law. Harvard Law Review101(7): 1331–1387.
16.
CrenshawKW (1991) Race, gender, and sexual harassment. Southern California Legal Review65: 1467–1476.
17.
DaleALindleyJDexS, et al (2008) Women and Employment: Changing Lives and New Challenges, 1st Edition. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 81–106.
18.
DämmrichJKosyakovaYBlossfeldHP (2015) Gender and job-related non-formal training: a comparison of 20 countries. International Journal of Comparative Sociology56(6): 433–459.
19.
DieckhoffMSteiberN (2011) A re-assessment of common theoretical approaches to explain gender differences in continuing training participation. British Journal of Industrial Relations49(1): s135–s157.
20.
EinarsdóttirAHoelHLewisD (2015) ‘It’s nothing personal’: anti-homosexuality in the British workplace. Sociology49(6): 1183–1199.
21.
FarkasL (2017) Data collection in the field of ethnicity. Analysis and comparative review of data collection practices in the EU. Brussels: European Commission DG for Justice and Consumers.
22.
FeaginJ (2013) Systemic Racism: A Theory of Oppression. London: Routledge.
23.
FevreRRobinsonALewisD, et al (2013) The ill-treatment of employees with disabilities in British workplaces. Work, Employment and Society27(2): 288–307.
24.
FredericNSFalomir-PichastorJM (2018) Heterogeneity of ingroup identity and anti-immigrant prejudice: the moderating role of RWA and outgroup homogeneity. International Review of Social Psychology31(1): 1–12.
25.
GalgócziBLeschkeJ (2016) EU Labour Migration in Troubled Times: Skills Mismatch, Return and Policy Responses. London: Routledge.
26.
GeeGCPavalkoEKLongJS (2007) Age, cohort and perceived age discrimination: using the life course to assess self-reported age discrimination. Social Forces86(1): 265–290.
27.
GreenFZhuY (2010) Overqualification, job dissatisfaction, and increasing dispersion in the returns to graduate education. Oxford Economic Papers62(4): 740–763.
28.
HabtegiorgisAEParadiesY (2013) Utilising self-report data to measure racial discrimination in the labour market. Australian Journal of Labour Economics16(1): 5–41.
29.
HarrisLCOgbonnaE (2015) Ethnic gatekeeping on the shopfloor: a study of bases, motives and approaches. Work, Employment and Society30(1): 59–76.
30.
HealyGBradleyHForsonC (2011) Intersectional sensibilities in analysing inequality regimes in public sector organizations. Gender, Work and Organization18(5): 467–487.
31.
HeathACheungSY (2006) Ethnic penalties in the labour market: employers and discrimination. DWP Research Report No. 341. Sheffield: DWP.
32.
HudsonMNettoGNoonM, et al (2017) Ethnicity and low wage traps: favouritism, homosocial reproduction and economic marginalization. Work, Employment and Society31(6): 992–1009.
33.
JohnstonRSirkeciIKhattabN, et al (2010) Ethno-religious categories and measuring occupational attainment in relation to education in England and Wales: a multilevel analysis. Environment and Planning A42(3): 578–591.
34.
KanterRM (2008) Men and Women of the Corporation: New Edition. New York: Basic Books.
35.
KarlsonKBHolmABreenR (2012) Comparing regression coefficients between same-sample nested models using logit and probit. Sociological Methodology42(1): 286–313.
36.
KesslerRCMickelsonKDWilliamsDR (1999) The prevalence, distribution, and mental health correlates of perceived discrimination in the United States. Journal of Health and Social Behavior40(3): 208–230.
37.
KhattabN (2009) Ethno-religious background as a determinant of educational and occupational attainment in Britain. Sociology43(2): 304–322.
38.
KingstonGMcGinnityFO’ConnellPJ (2015) Discrimination in the labour market: nationality, ethnicity and the recession. Work, employment and society29(2), 213–232.
39.
KislevE (2016) Deciphering the ‘ethnic penalty’ of immigrants in Western Europe: a cross-classified multilevel analysis. Social Indicators Research134(2): 725–745.
40.
KlerP (2006) Graduate overeducation and its effects among recently arrived immigrants to Australia: a longitudinal survey. International Migration44(5): 93–128.
41.
KuhnP (1990) Sex discrimination in labor markets: the role of statistical evidence: reply. American Economic Review80(1): 290–297.
42.
LeuvenEOosterbeekH (2011) Overeducation and mismatch in the labor market. In: HanushekEAMachinSWoessmannL (eds) Handbook of the Economics of Education, vol. 4. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 283–326.
43.
LivingstoneD (2017) Skill under-utilization. In: WarhurstCMayhewKFinegoldD, et al (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Skills and Training. Oxford: OU Press, 281–301.
44.
LongJSFreeseJ (2014) Regression Models for Categorical Dependent Variables Using Stata, 3rd Edition. College Station, TX: Stata Press.
45.
LongarelaIR (2016) Explaining vertical gender segregation: a research agenda. Work, Employment and Society31(5): 861–871.
46.
MachadoJAFMataJ (2005) Counterfactual decomposition of changes in wage distributions using quantile regression. Journal of Applied Econometrics20(4): 445–465.
47.
MacKinnonDPKrullJLLockwoodCM (2000) Equivalence of the mediation, confounding and suppression effect. Prevention Science1(4): 173–181.
48.
Mik-MeyerN (2016) Disability and ‘care’: managers, employees and colleagues with impairments negotiating the social order of disability. Work, Employment and Society30(6): 984–999.
49.
MouzelisN (2003) Sociological Theory: What Went Wrong? Diagnosis and Remedies. Abingdon: Routledge.
50.
NoonM (2018) Pointless diversity training: unconscious bias, new racism and agency. Work, Employment and Society32(1): 198–209.
51.
OaxacaR (1973) Male-female wage differentials in urban labor markets. International Economic Review14(3): 693–709.
52.
O’ConnorA (2017) The Nature of Prejudice. London: Macat Library.
53.
O’ReillyJEichhorstWGábosA, et al (2015) Five characteristics of youth unemployment in Europe. Flexibility, Education, Migration, Family Legacies, and EU Policy. SAGE Open5(1): 1–19.
54.
PagerDPedullaDS (2015) Race, self-selection, and the job search process. American Journal of Sociology120(4): 1005–1054.
55.
PagerDShepherdH (2008) The sociology of discrimination: racial discrimination in employment, housing, credit, and consumer markets. Annual Review of Sociology34: 181–209.
56.
PetersenTSaportaI (2004) The opportunity structure for discrimination. American Journal of Sociology109(4): 852–901.
57.
Prokic-BreuerTMcManusPA (2016) Immigrant educational mismatch in Western Europe, apparent or real?European Sociological Review32(3): 411–438.
58.
RaffertyA (2012) Ethnic penalties in graduate level over-education, unemployment and wages: evidence from Britain. Work, Employment and Society26(6): 987–1006.
59.
ReitzJG (2001) Immigrant skill utilization in the Canadian labour market: Implications of human capital research. Journal of International Migration and Integration/Revue de l’integration et de la migration internationale2(3):347–378.
60.
ReskinB (2005) Including mechanisms in our models of ascriptive inequality. In: NielsenLBNelsonRL (eds) Handbook of Employment Discrimination Research. Dordrecht: Springer, 75–97.
61.
ReskinBFBielbyDD (2005) A sociological perspective on gender and career outcomes. Journal of Economic Perspectives19(1): 71–86.
62.
RiachPARichJ (2002) Field experiments of discrimination in the market place. The Economic Journal112(483): F480–F518.
63.
RuberyJGrimshawDFigueiredoH (2005) How to close the gender pay gap in Europe: towards the gender mainstreaming of pay policy. Industrial Relations Journal36(3): 184–213.
64.
SeidelMDLPolzerJTStewartKJ (2000) Friends in high places: the effects of social networks on discrimination in salary negotiations. Administrative Science Quarterly45(1): 1–24.
65.
ShieldsMAPriceSW (1999) Ethnic differences in British employer-funded on and off-the-job training. Applied Economics Letters6(7): 421–429.
66.
SirkeciIAcikN (2018) Barriers for highly qualified A8 immigrants in the UK labour market. Work, Employment and Society32(5): 906–924.
67.
ThomasKJ (2010) Racial and ethnic disparities in education-occupation mismatch status among immigrants in South Africa and the United States. Journal of International Migration and Integration/Revue de l’integration et de la migration internationale11(4): 383–401.
68.
ThomasKJ (2015) Occupational stratification, job-mismatches, and child poverty: understanding the disadvantage of Black immigrants in the US. Social Science Research50: 203–216.
69.
TimmingAR (2016) The effect of foreign accent on employability: a study of the aural dimensions of aesthetic labour in customer-facing and non-customer-facing jobs. Work, Employment and Society31(3): 409–428.
70.
Tomaskovic-DeveyDThomasMJohnsonK (2005) Race and the accumulation of human capital across the career: a theoretical model and fixed-effects application. American Journal of Sociology111(1): 58–89.
71.
TriventiM (2013) The gender wage gap and its institutional context: a comparative analysis of European graduates. Work, Employment and Society27(4): 563–580.
WellerSA (2016) Discrimination, labour markets and the labour market prospects of older workers: what can a legal case teach us?Work, Employment and Society21(3): 417–437.
74.
WhittleS (2012) Respect and Equality: Transsexual and Transgender Rights. London: Routledge-Cavendish.
75.
ZickAWolfCKüpperB, et al (2008) The syndrome of group-focused enmity: the interrelation of prejudices tested with multiple cross-sectional and panel data. Journal of Social Issues64(2): 363–383.
76.
ZschirntERuedinD (2016) Ethnic discrimination in hiring decisions: a meta-analysis of correspondence tests 1990–2015. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies42(7): 1115–1134.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
