Social Contacts and Race/Ethnic Job Matching

Abstract

Scholarly literature and the media often tout networking as an effective route for obtaining quality employment. Some scholars, however, have cautioned that racially segregated social networks may produce racially segregated workgroups and differential opportunity structures over time. Drawing from theoretical perspectives pertaining to social closure and analyzing data from the Multi-City Study of Urban Inequality, this article analyses the role of social contacts and race/ethnic matching in employment. The findings reveal that among individuals using contacts in job searches, same-race contacts dramatically increase race/ethnic matching for all status groups. On the other hand, using a cross-race contact, while a rare event, strongly discourages this process. The results also show that race/ethnic matching is reduced with increases in educational attainment and in larger workplaces. Further analyses highlighting the quality of jobs attained through same- and cross-race social contacts show that cross-race contacts do not provide access to higher paying jobs nor jobs with authority. They do, however, increase access to lower-level supervisory positions for blacks and Hispanics.