Nov 4, 2009

Hire ugly people

Marty Nemko explains: (Hat tip: the Door)

All other things being equal, I'd give the nod to an ugly candidate. It’s not charity: They have less value in the marketplace and can be hired less expensively, even though looks have, for most jobs, little or no bearing on job performance. I've found that, on average, ugly people are more likely to be kind and to work harder because they know they're working at a disadvantage. And unattractive people are more likely to stay with me because they tend to have a tough time getting hired, in part because they generally don’t network efficiently. If I treat unattractive employees well, they’re usually very loyal.

You could make a similar argument for short people. If there are labor market inefficiencies with respect to attractiveness and height, why should we think they do not also exist with age, gender, intelligence, race, etc.?