Distance learning and job discrimination: examining the impact of distance learning and education on job market outcomes

Discrimination is invasive and protean. For illustration, in has been found that racial minorities need to get more education than their white counterparts of similar cognitive ability to get a job (Lang & Manove, 2011), candidates with white-sounding names are more likely to receive call-backs than African-American sounding names (Bertrand & Mullainathan, 2004; Galarza & Yamada, 2014), attractive employees (either males or females) receive 5% to 10% larger wages than unattractive ones (Cipriani & Zago, 2011; Hamermesh & Biddle, 1994; Harper, 2000; Heilman & Saruwatari, 1979; Marlowe et al., 1996; Ruffle & Shtudiner, 2015; Watkins & Johnston, 2000) and older candidates receive fewer call-backs as soon as they enter in their 40s (Carlsson & Eriksson, 2019). Even hair colour can be a source of discrimination: blondes (resp. red heads) are less (resp. more) likely to be selected in corporate leadership positions (Takeda et al., 2006). Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, more than 1.2 billion children in 186 countries were affected by school closures and many of them had to pass to online teaching (https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/coronavirus-education-global-covid19-online-digital-learning/). The interest on education technology and for online education was already growing before the Covid-19 crisis. Online teaching or distance learning was present before the Covid-19. Motivations to enrol on distance learning were different: people could opt for distance learning because of school phobia, because of bullying and moral harassment, because of physical distance or because of intrinsic preferences for remote teaching and educational technology. Traditionally, in France, around 120.000 people enrol in the National Centre for Distance Learning (CNED) and 60% of them are young students (primary and secondary education). During the Covid-19 crisis, the CNED was used by more than 3.3 million people mainly because, distance learning could continue without disruption even in events like snow days or the COVID-19 pandemic (which is not the case for online teaching). Nevertheless, there is, to our knowledge, no study directly examining the impact of distance learning (and distance learning diplomas) on job market outcomes. The allocation-of-time model (Becker, 1965) suggests the importance of academics in developing important skills that will increase one’s job attractiveness or will serve as a signal in the labour market (Spence, 1973; Stiglitz, 1975). However, Becker’s model does not differentiate campus-based (traditional) teaching from distance teaching. It is assumed that campus-based teaching develops important cognitive skills such as team-spirit, adaptation, cooperation or even the comprehension of reciprocity concepts. Such skills may not develop in the absence of regular social interactions and ties. Therefore, one may associate important cognitive skills (adaptation or cooperation) to campus-based learning (and not to distance learning) and may discriminate based on those beliefs. Our research project aims at investigating whether people who were enrolled in distance learning may suffer from job market discrimination because recruiters associate the development of important cognitive skills (such as team-work and adaptation) to campus-based learning (face-to-face teaching). More precisely, our research project tackles the two following questions: 1) do people associate important cognitive skills as teamwork and adaptation to campus-based learning or distance learning? And 2) because they make such an implicit association, are they more likely to discriminate candidates who were enrolled in distance learning compared to candidates who were enrolled in campus-based learning?