sugarmama links a study saying people with unusual names have trouble getting hired in corporate America:
A professor of economics at Harvard discusses how unusual black American naming conventions decreases the unfortunately named’s chances of getting hired.
He states that distinctive “black” names are an indicator of low socioeconomic status. In other words, if your parents named you something stupid like “Clitoris” or “Sasquatchataniqueeia” is an obvious cue to those who review resumes that your parents were uneducated and poor. The HR people will pass you up for someone named “John” or “Susan”.
If employers believe, rightly or wrongly, that such a background lowers the chance of job success, this may help explain why audit studies find that employers react negatively to black-sounding names on resumes, which contain current education but little other socioeconomic information.
This isn’t surprising, I suppose. And while part of this may be racism, I suspect, as noted by a commenter to the post, that those named Dweezil or Moon Unit would have similar problems.
The National Basketball Association, however, would seem to be a major outlyer in this trend.
