Study Finds Gay Men Encounter More Job Discrimination Than Lesbians Do Gay men earn less than straight men because of employer discrimination, according to a new study published in the Journal of Labor Research.
According to the authors — Bruce Elmslie, a professor of economics at the University of New Hampshire, and Edinaldo Tebaldi, a former assistant professor of economics at UNH and now at Bryant University — gay men who live together earn 23 percent less than their married peers and 9 percent less than unmarried heterosexual men who reside with a woman. Not surprisingly, discrimination is most prevalent in male-dominated management and in blue-collar jobs such as construction.
Interestingly enough, the study, which is based on labor and wage data from 91,000 heterosexual and homosexual couples collected by a 2004 U.S. Census survey, showed that lesbians actually encounter less discrimination than heterosexual women do. The authors suggest that although some employers may hold negative attitudes toward lesbians, gay women may actually benefit from the perception that they are more career-oriented and less likely to take time out to raise children than are heterosexual women. The study found that only 18.1 percent of lesbians have children, versus 49.4 percent of straight women.
So why do gay men face more bias? Anti-gay attitudes connected with AIDS may be one reason. Another may be that some employers and customers disapprove of their lifestyle. “Employers may disapprove of gay lifestyles and act on this bias in making hiring decisions,” the authors said. Likewise, “if customers prefer to interact with heterosexual employees, the owner will act on the customer’s taste for discrimination,” they added.