Panel Paper: Heterogeneity in Non-Discrimination Laws and the Effects of LGBT Employment Protections

Thursday, November 6, 2014 : 3:25 PM
San Juan (Convention Center)

*Names in bold indicate Presenter

Ian Burn, University of California, Irvine
This paper looks at legal differences in state-level employment nondiscrimination acts (ENDAs) for gay men and lesbian women. In contrast to the previous literature on LGBT employment protections, this paper focuses on what effect the differences in legal protections provided by the laws have upon the labor market outcomes of gays and lesbians. Using a fixed effects model, I find that ENDAs increase the wages of gay men, but decrease the wages of lesbians women. Controlling for the differences in these laws results in much larger increases in the wages of gay men covered by ENDAs.  They also increase hours and weeks worked for gay men. For lesbians, there is a decline in wages and in weeks worked. Once the strength of law is accounted for, states with stronger laws experience no such decline for lesbians. Attorney’s fees being recouped after a successful suit and longer complaint periods are associated with stronger effects. Smaller employer size minimums have a small, but not statistically significant effect. The results of this paper provide an important contribution to the understanding of how employment non-discrimination laws reduce discrimination and the provisions in the laws that drive these changes.