Cahier du LARJE n° 2020 – 2 Seeking for tipping point in the housing market: evidence from a field experiment

This study econometrically asses the presence of a tipping point on ethnic discrimination in the rental housing market. We measure discrimination in access to housing in New Caledonia by a large field experiment. Between 2015 and 2017, we sent six applications in response to 741 real-estate rental ads, for a total of 3,616 responses. Applicants have European, Kanak (the indigenous people) and Wallisian name and various signal of quality. Using data from the local census, we link the location of the offer and the neighbourhood composition. Probit random intercept regressions show that ethnic discrimination is stronger in neighbourhoods that are around the tipping point in ethnic composition.

Sylvain CHAREYRON, Université Paris-Est, ERUDITE (EA 437), TEPP-CNRS (FR 3435), UPEC, UPEM, F-94010, Créteil, France

Samuel GOROHOUNA, Université de la Nouvelle-Calédonie – LARJE

Yannick L’Horty, Université Paris-Est, ERUDITE (EA 437), TEPP-CNRS (FR 3435), UPEC, UPEM, F-77454 Marne-La-Vallée France

Pascale Petit, Université Paris-Est, ERUDITE (EA 437), TEPP-CNRS (FR 3435), UPEC, UPEM, F-77454 Marne-La-Vallée France

Catherine Ris, Université de la Nouvelle-Calédonie – LARJE