nep-gen New Economics Papers
on Gender
Issue of 2019‒11‒11
five papers chosen by
Jan Sauermann
Stockholms universitet

  1. Social norms and gender discrimination in the labor market: An agent-based exercise By Quintero Rojas, Coralia Azucena; Viianto, Lari Artur
  2. About Time: The Narrowing Gender Wage Gap in Austria By René Böheim; Marian Fink; Christine Zulehner
  3. Child Penalties and Financial Incentives: Exploiting Variation along the Wage distribution By Pierre PORA; Lionel WILNER
  4. Identity and Learning: a study on the effect of student-teacher gender interaction on student's learning By Sukanta Bhattacharya; Aparajita Dasgupta; Kumarjit Mandal; Anirban Mukherjee
  5. (In)Visibility, Care and Cultural Barriers: The Size and Shape of Women's Work in India By Ashwini Deshpande; Naila Kabeer

  1. By: Quintero Rojas, Coralia Azucena; Viianto, Lari Artur
    Abstract: The incorporation of women into the labor market remains a challenge for most countries; likewise, gender gaps are observed in indicators such as employment, unemployment and participation. In this paper we study the role of social norms in the labor market performance per gender; that is, how gender gaps arise from conservative gender roles. To this end, we construct an agent-based model where discrimination appears when information on job vacancies is transmitted within a social network with preference to a given gender. Networks are defined by size, closeness and links per family. Our results show that: Social networks enhance the chance of getting a job. Discrimination deepens gender gaps. Discrimination does not favor the employment situation of households, since the share of non-income households (both members unemployed) is not reduced. Rather, discrimination reduces the number of two-income households in favor of the single-income households where only the man is employed.
    Keywords: social networks, social norms, gender inequality, discrimination, labor markets, economic systems.
    JEL: C63 D85 J71
    Date: 2019–10–20
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:96752&r=all
  2. By: René Böheim (WIFO); Marian Fink; Christine Zulehner
    Abstract: We examine the gender wage gap in Austria from 2005 to 2017 using data from EU-SILC. The raw wage gap declined from 18.6 log points in 2005 to 14.9 log points in 2017. We use standard decomposition techniques that correct for differences in the distributions of human capital and other variables between men and women. All calculated decompositions indicate that the unexplained part of the gender wage gap decreased substantially over the last ten years. The decrease of the unexplained gender wage gap between the largest gap in this period (2006) and the most recent gap (2017) ranges from 3.7 log points to 8.5 log points depending on the decomposition approach. Using the approach developed by Neumark (1988), the corrected wage gap shrank from 8.7 log points in 2005 (8.8 log points in 2006) to 5.1 log points in 2017. The main reason for the decline in wage differences is the relative improvement of women's observed and unobserved characteristics.
    Keywords: gender wage differentials, wage inequality, decomposition, EU-SILC
    Date: 2019–10–31
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wfo:wpaper:y:2019:i:589&r=all
  3. By: Pierre PORA (Insee-Crest.); Lionel WILNER (Insee-Crest.)
    Abstract: We relate women's labor earnings losses due to motherhood to their prechildbirth rank in the distribution of hourly wages. Using French administrative data, we show that these \child penalties" decrease steeply along the distribution; by contrast, the related hourly wage losses are fairly homogeneous. Low-wage mothers opt out of the labor market or reduce their working hours more frequently; the magnitude of such responses is consistently monotonic along the distribution. This empirical evidence highlights the relevance of financial incentives and suggests that child penalties arise from decisions based on specialization gains rather than on gender differences in preferences or on gender norms.
    Keywords: Gender pay gap, child penalties, labor supply, difference-in-difference, wage distribution.
    JEL: J13 J16 J22 J31
    Date: 2019–09–27
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crs:wpaper:2019-17&r=all
  4. By: Sukanta Bhattacharya (University of Calcutta); Aparajita Dasgupta (Department of Economics, Ashoka University); Kumarjit Mandal (University of Calcutta); Anirban Mukherjee (University of Calcutta)
    Abstract: In this paper we examine whether students' and teachers' social identity play any role in the learning outcome of the students. More importantly, we ask if a student bene fits by learning from a teacher of the same gender. Unlike the existing literature which explains such interaction in terms of role model based effect, we explain such interaction in terms of gender based sorting across private and public schools. Our results are driven by two critical difference between male and female members. For male and female teachers, the difference comes from their differential opportunity costs of teaching in schools at remote locations. For students, the difference between male and female members comes from the differential return to their human capital investment by parents - where for girls, a lower fraction of the return comes to their parental families after they are married following patriarchal norm. These factors create a sorting pattern which leads to an impact of gender matching. We then test our theoretical results using survey data collected from Andhra Pradesh.
    Keywords: education; gender; learning; student-teacher interaction; identity
    Date: 2019–07
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ash:wpaper:14&r=all
  5. By: Ashwini Deshpande (Department of Economics, Ashoka University); Naila Kabeer (Department of Gender Studies and Department of International Development, London School of Economics)
    Abstract: Based on primary data from a large household survey in seven districts in West Bengal in India, this paper analyses the reasons underlying low labor force participation of women. In particular, we try to disentangle the intertwined strands of choice, constraints posed by domestic work and care responsibilities, and the predominant understanding of cultural norms as factors explaining the low labor force participation as measured by involvement in paid work. We document the fuzziness of the boundary between domestic work and unpaid (and therefore invisible) economic work that leads to mis-measurement of women's work and suggest methods to improve measurement. We find that being primarily responsible for domestic chores lower the probability of “working†, after accounting for all the conventional factors. We also document how, for women, being out of paid work is not synonymous with care or domestic work, as they are involved in expenditure saving activities. We also find that religion and visible markers such as veiling are not significant determinants of the probability of working. Our data shows substantial unmet demand for work. Given that women are primarily responsible for domestic chores, we also document that women express a demand for work that would be compatible with household chores.
    Keywords: Women, Gender, Labor Force Participation, India
    Date: 2019–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ash:wpaper:10&r=all

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