We analyze the role of physical appearance, race, and sex at the earliest stage of the hiring process, by using a résumé audit study. We randomly assigned surnames and photographs to the 4,899 fictitious résumés sent in response to 1,247 job openings in Lima, Peru. Candidates who are beautiful, have a white-sounding surname, and are males receive more callbacks for interviews than their counterparts, thus imposing a triple penalty on homely-looking, indigenous, and female candidates. The magnitude of such penalty is particularly large in the case of physical appearance.

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