Beauty and the Labor Market: Accounting for the additional effects of personality and grooming

Abstract

This paper examines the influence of three non-cognitive personal traits - beauty, personality, and grooming - on the labor market earnings of young adults. It extends the analyses of Hamermesh and Biddle [1994, American Economic Review 84(5): 1174-1194] and others who focus primarily on the effects of beauty on labor market earnings. We find that personality and grooming significantly affect wages, and their inclusion in a model of wage determination reduces somewhat the effects of beauty. We also find some evidence of employer discrimination based on these traits in the setting of wages. © 2011 CEIS, Fondazione Giacomo Brodolini and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.