nep-gen New Economics Papers
on Gender
Issue of 2017‒05‒14
eight papers chosen by
Jan Sauermann
Stockholms universitet

  1. The gender lifetime earnings gap: Exploring gendered pay from the life course perspective By Boll, Christina; Jahn, Malte; Lagemann, Andreas
  2. Differences in Positions along a Hierarchy: Counterfactuals Based on an Assignment Model By Gobillon, Laurent; Meurs, Dominique; Roux, Sébastien
  3. It Pays to Be a Man: Rewards for Leaders in a Coordination Game By Philip J. Grossman; Catherine Eckel; Mana Komai; Wei Zhan
  4. Do Women in Highly Qualified Positions Face Higher Work-to-Family Conflicts in Germany Than Men? By Busch-Heizmann, Anne; Holst, Elke
  5. Fathers, Parental Leave and Gender Norms By Unterhofer, Ulrike; Wrohlich, Katharina
  6. Household Matters: Revisiting the Returns to Capital among Female Micro-entrepreneurs By Bernhardt, Arielle; Field, Erica; Pande, Rohini; Rigol, Natalia
  7. Empirical evidence of the gender pay gap in NZ By Gail Pacheco; Chao Li; Bill Cochrane
  8. Gender identity and female labour supply in Brazil By Karen Codazzi; Valéria Pero; André Sant’Anna

  1. By: Boll, Christina; Jahn, Malte; Lagemann, Andreas
    Abstract: Research on the gender earnings divide so far mostly focuses on the gender gap in hourly wages which, due to its snapshot nature, is inappropriate to capture the biographical dimension of gendered pay. With the 'gender lifetime earnings gap' (GLEG), we introduce a new measure that meets this requirement. Based on a group of 93,511 German individuals born 1950-64 from the 'Sample of Integrated Labour Market Biographies' (SIAB 7510), we find that at the end of the employment career, women accumulated 49.8 % less earnings than men. Thus, the GLEG is more than twice as high as the current German gender pay gap. The GLEG is the largest (smallest) at the bottom (top) of the earnings distribution. It most prominently widens during the period of family formation (age 25-35). Relatedly, gender differences in endowments, mainly in terms of experience and hours, answer for three quarters of the GLEG. For younger cohorts, family breaks tend to lose importance whereas the role of work hours remains unchanged. Furthermore, the GLEG notably differs between occupational segments.
    Keywords: lifetime earnings,Blinder & Oaxaca decomposition,occupational segments,cohort analysis,gender,life course,wage distribution,wage gap
    JEL: D31 J31 J16
    Date: 2017
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:hwwirp:179&r=gen
  2. By: Gobillon, Laurent (Paris School of Economics); Meurs, Dominique (University Paris Ouest-Nanterre); Roux, Sébastien (CREST-INSEE)
    Abstract: We propose an assignment model in which positions along a hierarchy are attributed to individuals depending on their characteristics. Our theoretical framework can be used to study differences in assignment and outcomes across groups and we show how it can motivate decomposition and counterfactual exercises. It constitutes an alternative to more descriptive methods such as Oaxaca decompositions and quantile counterfactual approaches. In an application, we study gender disparities in the public and private sectors with a French exhaustive administrative dataset. Whereas females are believed to be treated more fairly in the public sector, we find that the gender gap in propensity to get job positions along the wage distribution is rather similar in the two sectors. The gender wage gap in the public sector is 13% and it increases by only 0.7 percentage points when workers are assigned to job positions according to the rules of the private sector. Nevertheless, the gender gap at the last decile in the public sector increases by as much as 3.6 percentage points when using the assignment rules of the private sector.
    Keywords: gender, wages, counterfactuals, distributions, assignment, public sector
    JEL: C51 J31 J45
    Date: 2017–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10726&r=gen
  3. By: Philip J. Grossman; Catherine Eckel; Mana Komai; Wei Zhan
    Abstract: We address followers’ gender-based perception of leader’s effectiveness. Our experiment’s design removes factors that might affect leadership success, such as risk-taking and competitiveness. We employ a repeated weakest-link coordination game; 10 periods without a leader and 10 periods after the leader makes a short, “scripted” speech advising followers on how to maximize earnings. Followers then choose a costly bonus for the leader. The leader’s gender is the only variable that changes across sessions. Followers are more likely to heed the advice of the male leaders, are less likely to ascribe success to female leaders, and reward male leaders more.
    Keywords: Leadership, Gender, Coordination Game
    JEL: C92 J71 J16
    Date: 2017–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mos:moswps:2017-01&r=gen
  4. By: Busch-Heizmann, Anne (University of Duisburg-Essen); Holst, Elke (DIW Berlin)
    Abstract: Changing employment conditions lead to new chances, but also new risks for employees. In the literature, increasing permeability between occupational and private life is discussed as one special outcome of this development that employees must face, especially those in highly qualified positions. Drawing on existing research, we investigate in how far women and men in those positions differ in their perceived work-to-family conflicts (WFC), considering the mediating role of gender specific job opportunities. Referring conflicting theoretical arguments, we hypothesize that in Germany – as a conservative welfare state – women, especially those with family responsibilities, will perceive higher WFC than men in those positions. Our analysis is based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP). Using the Siegrist instrument on effort-reward imbalance we find that women in highly qualified positions perceive higher WFC than men. This association is explained by women's lower willingness to take risks, and also party explained by lower job rewards women receive. It gets visible even more strongly if women's lower time-based burdens in the job are controlled for. Mixed results are observed concerning associations between family responsibilities and WFC, which is in line with ambivalent results in the literature.
    Keywords: work-to-family conflict, highly qualified positions, managers, gender, SOEP
    JEL: I3 B54 M1
    Date: 2017–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10716&r=gen
  5. By: Unterhofer, Ulrike (DIW Berlin); Wrohlich, Katharina (DIW Berlin)
    Abstract: Social norms and attitudes towards gender roles have been shown to have a large effect on economic outcomes of men and women. Many countries have introduced policies that aim at changing gender stereotypes, for example fathers' quota in parental leave schemes. In this paper, we analyze whether the introduction of the fathers' quota in Germany in 2007, that caused a sharp increase in the take-up of parental leave by fathers, has changed the attitudes towards gender roles in the grandparents' generation. To this end, we exploit the quasi-experimental setting of the 2007 reform and compare grandparents whose son had a child born before the 2007 reform to grandparents whose son had a child born after it. Our results suggest that such policy programs not only induce direct behavioral responses by the target group but also have indirect effects on non-treated individuals through social interaction and can thus change attitudes towards gender roles in a society as a whole.
    Keywords: parental leave, gender equality, social norms, social interaction, policy evaluation
    JEL: J16 H31 J18 D13 J22
    Date: 2017–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10712&r=gen
  6. By: Bernhardt, Arielle; Field, Erica; Pande, Rohini; Rigol, Natalia
    Abstract: Several field experiments find positive returns to grants for male and not female micro-entrepreneurs. But, these analyses largely overlook that male and female micro-entrepreneurs often belong to the same household. Using data from randomized trials in India, Sri Lanka and Ghana, we show that the gender gap in microenterprise performance is not due to a gap in aptitude. Instead, low average returns of female-run enterprises are observed because women's capital is invested into their husbands' enterprises rather than their own. When women are the sole household enterprise operator, capital shocks lead to large increases in profits. Household-level income gains are equivalent regardless of the grant or loan recipient's gender.
    Date: 2017–04
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11981&r=gen
  7. By: Gail Pacheco (School of Economics, Faculty of Business, Economics, and Law, Auckland Univeristy of Technology); Chao Li; Bill Cochrane
    Abstract: Using recent data, and a variety of econometric techniques, this study examines the gender pay gap in New Zealand (NZ). The need for this study arises as the information that is regularly cited on the pay gap (based on average or median earnings for males and females) does not control for differences in individual, household, occupation, industry or other job characteristics, and there has been a lack of robust analysis in NZ, based on data post‐2003.
    Date: 2017–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aut:wpaper:201705&r=gen
  8. By: Karen Codazzi; Valéria Pero; André Sant’Anna
    Abstract: Over the last half-century, the role of women in society has changed substantially. However, the gender income gap and the difference in labour force participation persist. Akerlof and Kranton introduce the concept of identity from sociology and social psychology at the economic analysis; based on this we search less traditional factors for understanding this persistence. We extend the analysis proposed by Bertrand et al. for Brazil. Specifically, we analyse the impact of gender identity, focusing on the prescription that ‘a man should earn more than his wife’ on social and economic results. Based on the Censuses for 1991, 2000, and 2010 we observed that for only 7 per cent of married couples does the wife earn more than her husband. We found evidence that the wives with greater probability of earning more than their husbands are less likely to participate in the labour force. Once she does participate in the labour force, she has a higher probability of earning less than her potential income, working fewer hours, and having an informal job.
    Date: 2017
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp2017-105&r=gen

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