https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1849-8022
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ABSTRACT
There is ample evidence that immigrants are at a disadvantage in the labour market. Previous studies show that discrimination and devaluation are important factors in explaining why immigrants are occupationally segregated. Three kinds of discriminatory behaviours can be distinguished: aversions, cognitive biases, and erroneous attributions. The present article is part of the debate on the mechanisms that generate inequality and argues that the attitudinal context (social norm) influences labour market outcomes by moderating the impact of these three discriminatory behaviours. This idea is empirically examined in an analysis of the role of openness towards immigrants on the immigrant-native occupational status gap and in the comparative advantage of their language skills. Data from the Adult Education Survey is modelled together with contextual data from the European Social Survey using country fixed-effects regressions. The results indicate that immigrants are at a disadvantage, although the extent of this disadvantage varies significantly among countries partly due to the influence of openness towards immigrants.
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No potential conflict of interest is reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Selection into employment might lead to biased estimations. To address this possibility, we ran a two-step Heckman procedure.
2 Although the AES survey was conducted in more than 30 countries, only those with information for the attitudinal context (openness towards immigrants) available in the ESS were used: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Switzerland, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Germany, Denmark, Estonia, Greece, Spain, Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Slovenia, Slovakia.
3 The different levels of language competence that the respondent can choose in the AES survey are presented as a description and not as labels. The AES manual converts these classifications into levels on the Council of Europe scale. We establish the following attribution for this study: Proficient: I can understand a wide range of demanding texts and use the language flexibly. I master the language almost completely. Vantage: I can understand the essential of clear language and produce simple text. I can describe experiences and events and communicate fairly fluently. And Basic: I can understand and use the most common everyday expressions. I use the language in relation to familiar things and situations.
4 An alternative to this procedure would be multilevel modelling, which is very popular among sociologists. However, recent studies have suggested that in cross-country analysis with fewer than 25 contextual observations with few contextual observations (n < 25), the application of this regression procedure results in unreliable estimates for country-level variables and cross-level interaction effects (Bryan and Jenkins Citation2016). Thus, in cross-country comparative studies in which the aim is to estimate cross-level interactions, fixed-effects are a desirable option and provide reliable estimations of the moderator variables by controlling for country heterogeneity.
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Josep Ubalde
Josep Ubalde has recently completed his PhD in the Faculty of Business and Economics in the Universitat Rovira i Virgili. His research centres around labour market inequalities, social cohesion and ideologies. Language has been a central element in his research in studying these issues.
Amado Alarcón
Amado Alarcón is Professor of Sociology at the Universitat Rovira i Virgili. His research is focused on the relations between work and language. He has published on this subject in several journals, such as Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Language in Society and International Journal of the Sociology of Language.