In times past, stewardesses were usually attractive women, and this arrangement added to the pleasure of many air travelers, usually men. By the 1990s, however, stewardesses had become flight attendants, who were much less likely to be attractive and were sometimes even male. Many people view these changes as progress.Read more at location 654
Is it not a good thing if flight attendants are selected by job skills-meaning the ability to serve people well and to carry out safety procedures efficiently-and not at all on physical appearance? I would say no. The only meaningful measure of productivity is the amount that a worker adds to customer satisfaction (and, hence, to willingness to pay)Read more at location 657
I would say no. The only meaningful measure of productivity is the amount that a worker adds to customer satisfactionRead more at location 658
A worker's physical appearance-to the extent that this characteristic is valued by customers and coworkers-is as legitimate a job qualification as intelligence, dexterity, job experience, personality, and so on. Read more at location 660
it makes no sense to say that employment and wages based on physical appearance is a form of discrimination, whereas employment and wages based on intelligence is something else. The two cases are fundamentally the same. Read more at location 667
Most people (and the law) accept this approach to beauty for some fields, for example, for movie and television personalities and modeling.Read more at location 669
But the difference between glamour fields and others in terms of the role of physical appearance is merely a matter of degree.Read more at location 670
The legitimacy of beauty as a job qualification even for movies and television was challenged in the litigious 1990s. In a celebrated court case in 1998, a jury determined that Hunter Tylo was, despite being pregnant, sufficiently attractive to appear on the television programRead more at location 674
Some solace can be taken from the 1997 settlement involving the restaurant chain Hooters. This agreement allowed the company to continue to limit its wait staff to attractive young women.Read more at location 677
A number of research studies have documented that beautiful people do better in life. Dan Hamermesh and his coworkers have used subjective information on appearance based on opinions of interviewers or of researchers looking at photographs.'Read more at location 679
the wage differential between attractive and ugly people is around 9 percent for women and 14 percent for men.Read more at location 682
A study by Susan Averett and Sanders Korenman measures attractiveness by body weight and finds that obesity lowers wages by similar amounts for women (12 percent) and men (9 percent).2Read more at location 684
by similar amounts for women (12 percent) and men (9 percent).2Read more at location 685
obesity may matter because of its correlation with other characteristics, such as health status and degree of self-control, rather than just for physical appearance. Read more at location 687
The problem is that discrimination in the marriage market has historically been much more important for women than discrimination in the job market.Read more at location 690
discrimination in the marriage market has historically been much more important for women than discrimination in the job market. Perhaps these researchers should have recommended an extension of the ADA to the marriage market. Read more at location 690
A more difficult issue is whether beauty counts in a relative or absolute sense. For instance, if everyone were suddenly to become more attractive, as judged by current standards, would we all be happier?Read more at location 697
Height is an example of a trait that is mainly relative;Read more at location 699
However, if beauty is only relative, then these investments are socially wasteful, and the government could rationalize a policy to discourage such expenditures. This line of reasoning could support taxes on cosmetics, hair coloring, antibaldness treatments, breast implants, high-heeled shoes, and so on.Read more at location 700
antibaldness treatments, breast implants, high-heeled shoes, and so on. But even in this case, it would be valuable to allocate beauty across sectors in an efficient manner, and, hence, it would still be reasonable for wages to reflect a beauty premium. Thus, more argument would be needed to expand the ADA to include ugliness as a socially protected disability. Perhaps the best idea is for the government to stay out of the beauty arena. AbortionRead more at location 701
