HONG KONG Aside from the moral implications, stigmatization of minority groups can translate into huge economic losses, research shows.
"Billions of dollars are lost simply because of treating LGBT [people] unfairly," said Lee Badgett at The Economist Intelligence Unit's Pride and Prejudice 2016 conference, which took place in Hong Kong, London and New York on March 3. Badgett, a professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, was referring to a study she carried out for the World Bank and the Nordic Trust Fund that was published in October 2014. For example, she found that India had seen 1.7% of its gross domestic output vanish due to LGBT discrimination in the workplace.
