Workplace inequality remains commonplace

Black men with the same skills as white males are half as likely to rise from supervisor to manager and black women are a third as likely to do so, according to a study by sociologist James Elliott of Tulane University, New Orleans, La., and professor Ryan A. Smith of City University of New York.

Elliott and Smith compiled statistics from two-hour interviews with 3,480 male and female workers from across the country. They divided respondents into three categories: laborers with no power; supervisors with the power only to supervise; and managers with the power to hire, fire, and set pay. From their statistics, the researchers determined that discrimination has common patterns throughout American workplaces, in small firms and large Fortune 500 companies alike.

The findings suggest that race and gender are not separate sources of discrimination but compound each other in limiting access to power and promotion. Elliott and Smith found that superiors are much more likely to fill positions of power with subordinates of the same race and sex as themselves. This tendency toward in-group favoritism is stronger in filling higher-level managerial positions than in lower-level supervisory slots.

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