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Since 2001 the National Science Foundation's ADVANCE program has distributed over $130 million in grants to improve work climate, enhance professional success, and increase recruitment and retention of female faculty in STEM fields. The process by which each institution designs and implements these interventions is seldom studied, however. Using climate surveys, administrative records, and a difference-in-differences regression approach, we assessed whether exposure to the design and implementation process helps explain improvements in climate and retention during the early years of ADVANCE implementation. We found that departments wherein at least one faculty member participated in ADVANCE committee work experienced significant improvements in job satisfaction among female faculty members and significant reduction in turnover among female full professors, suggesting that the ADVANCE design process was itself an intervention.

This paper examines the labor market effects of state health insurance mandates that increase the cost of employing a demographically identifiable group. State mandates requiring that health insurance plans cover infertility treatment raise the relative cost of insuring older women of child-bearing age. Empirically, wages in this group are unaffected, but their total labor input decreases. Workers do not value infertility mandates at cost, and so will not take wage cuts in exchange, leading employers to decrease their demand for this affected and identifiable group. Differences in the empirical effects of mandates found in the literature are explained by a model including variations in the elasticity of demand, moral hazard, ability to identify a group, and adverse selection. (Contains 19 footnotes, 2 figures and 8 tables.)

As baby boomers reach retirement age, demographic pressures on public programs may cause policy makers to cut benefits and encourage employment at later ages. But how much demand exists for older workers? This paper reports on a field experiment to determine hiring conditions for older women in entry-level jobs in two cities. A younger worker is more than 40 percent more likely to be offered an interview than is an older worker. No evidence is found to support taste-based discrimination as a reason for this differential, and some suggestive evidence is found to support statistical discrimination. (Contains 8 tables, 2 figures, and 36 footnotes.)

Many studies find that public sector employees are less discriminatory than private sector. One possible explanation for these differences is that people with public service training are less discriminatory. Using a laboratory experiment we compare how undergraduate and graduate students from a large southwestern university rate unique randomized clerical resumes by the race of the applicant. We find that students with public sector training at the undergraduate or graduate level tend to favor resumes with distinctively Black names, while non-government students slightly favor resumes with non-Black names. On average, students with public sector training or degrees rate resumes with Black names between 6% and 12% higher than do students with business or other training. There is no difference among those with and without public sector training in the time spent on resumes with distinctively Black names compared to those without. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses causal inference techniques for social scientists through the lens of applied microeconomics. We frame causal inference using the standard of the ideal experiment, emphasizing problems of omitted variable bias and reverse causality. We explore how laboratory and field experiments can succeed and fail to meet this ideal in practice. We then outline how different methods and the statistical assumptions behind them can lead to causal inference in nonexperimental contexts. We explain when problems with omitted variable bias can and cannot be addressed using observed controls. We consider tools for studying natural experiments, including difference-in-differences, instrumental variables, and regression discontinuity techniques. Finally, we discuss additional concerns that may arise such as weighting, clustering, multiple inference, and external validity. We include Stata code for implementing each of these methods as well as a series of checklists for researchers detailing important robustness and design checks. Throughout, we emphasize the importance of understanding the context of a study and implementing analyses in a way that acknowledges strengths and limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eye tracking is a technology that tracks eye activity including how long and where a participant is looking. As eye tracking technology has improved and become more affordable its use has expanded. We discuss how to design, implement, and analyze an experiment using this technology to study economic theory. Using our experience fielding an experiment to study hiring decisions we guide the reader through how to choose an eye tracker, concerns with participants and set-up, types of outputs, limitations of eye tracking, data management and data analysis. We conclude with suggestions for combining eye tracking with other measurements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses age discrimination and legislation in Great Britain and the U.S. The U.S. has federal legislation outlawing age discrimination in employment since the 1960s. In most European countries, such legislation have only been instituted recently. In 2006, the Council Directive 2000/78/EC reuired European Union member countries to develop their own age discrimination laws by 2006.