Sex Differentials in Earnings in the South Korean Labor Market

We examine gender differences in earnings among South Korean workers in 1988 – the year the South Korean National Assembly enacted the Equal Employment Opportunity Act. Using the "88 Occupational Wage Bargaining Survey on the Actual Condition," we calculate women's mean earnings as a percentage of men's mean earnings by major industrial category and educational attainment. We find a larger wage gap among clerical and sales workers than production workers or professionals. Generally, the more education a woman has, the smaller the gap between her earnings and those of her male counterparts. Women with a middle-school education have a mean income 53.5 percent that of comparable men, while the female-to-male wage ratio among college graduates is 76.1 percent. We analyze wage differences separately for women and men. Following Ronald Oaxaca's (1973) work, we decompose male–female wage differentials. We also calculate a discrimination coefficient. Our work shows that, all else equal, men earn from 33.6 percent to 46.9 percent more than women with comparable skills. We attribute the difference to gender discrimination.     

Public Sector Employment,Wage Inequality and the Gender Pay Ratio in the UK

This paper assesses the relative contributions of the different systems of pay determination in the private sector and the public sector toward the changing level of wage inequality and the gender pay ratio in the UK. The greater centralisation of pay arrangements in the public sector compared with the private sector in the UK suggests that public sector employment may have acted to offset the widening wage inequality seen in recent years, as well as making an important contribution to the increase in women's relative average earnings compared to men. This issue is addressed by drawing on unpublished occupational hourly earnings data from the New Earnings Survey and applying decomposition of the Theil index of wage inequality to analyse both static and dynamic trends. The change in wage inequality for the period 1986 to 1995 primarily reflected the change in wage dispersion within the private sector, and the narrowing of the gender pay gap among the public sector workforce was an important factor in explaining the overall improvement in women's relative earnings. The paper argues that the relatively centralised pay arrangements in the public sector, compared with the private sector, played an important role in slowing the increase in wage inequality and narrowing the gender pay gap. As such, future policies to decentralise pay determination in the UK public sector may exacerbate the increasing level of wage inequality and reverse women's recent relative pay improvements.     

部门间生产率差距、劳动力去工业化与结构性减速

基于中国劳动力就业结构出现过快和过早去工业化的迹象，本文从部门间生产率差距的视角，利用多部门一般均衡模型、数值模拟和计量实证分析方法研究发现：（1）理论上，当服务业劳动生产率增长慢于工业，部门间生产率差距将扩大，导致劳动力去工业化速率加快；且部门间生产率差距的存在使得劳动力去工业化对经济增长产生结构性减速效应。服务业部门生产率加快提升，部门间生产率差距将会缩小，从而减缓去工业化速率和降低结构性减速压力；工业部门生产率提升尽管会扩大部门间生产率差距从而加快劳动力去工业化，但在长期中起到均匀化经济增长速率的作用。（2）利用2001—2018年中国省级和城市级面板数据的计量实证分析发现，部门间生产率差距的存在导致劳动力去工业化的效应在全时段样本下显著，但劳动力去工业化对经济增长的结构性减速效应仅在2009—2018年区间样本下显著，表明近年来中国经济增长减速与部门间生产率差距及其导致的劳动力去工业化相关。（3）赶超成功与失败国家的经验比较也表明，工业与服务业部门劳动生产率的改善与协调是跨越中等收入陷阱以及跨越后实现持续赶超的关键。     

How do Labor Unions Influence the Gender Earnings Gap? A Comparative Study of the US and Korea

Abstract

This paper provides a comparative study of the United States and Korea regarding the effects of unions on gender earnings gaps in 2004. Using datasets representative of the population of the US and Korea, this contribution shows that gender differences in the workers' observed characteristics and the unobserved component reduce gender earnings gaps in union jobs in both the US and Korea. Fringe benefits in the union sector attract women workers with higher labor market qualifications into the union sector and thereby reduce the gender earnings gap in this sector. The study finds that this self-selection process in the union sector is stronger in Korea than in the US, but the seniority-based wage system that prevails in the Korean union sector widens the gender earnings gap.     

Panel estimates of the earnings gap in Norway: do female immigrants experience a double earnings penalty?

This study explores the possibility that being both a ‘female’ and an ‘immigrant’ will impose an earnings disadvantage on immigrant women in Norway. Well-known techniques are used to decompose the earnings gap between Norwegian men and immigrant women into portions attributable to productivity differentials, portions attributable to a gender effect, and portions attributable to an ethnic effect. The analysis supports the following conclusions: First, there is evidence of a double negative effect on female immigrant earnings. Second, gender effect is more important than ethnic effect. Finally, the discrimination estimates are robust to the alternative methods used in decomposing Norwegian men-immigrant women earnings gap.     

The Gender Wage Gap in Paid- and Self-Employment in Australia

This paper presents an analysis of the gender wage gap in the highly regulated Australian labour market. It compares wage outcomes in the wage and salary sector with those for the self-employed. Comparisons with the United States are provided. The large gender pay gap in self-employment suggests that the aggregate gender wage differential will not be eliminated solely through wage determination for wage and salary earners. The greater gender wage gap in the self-employed sector may reflect liquidity constraints that are more difficult for self-employed women to overcome relative to self-employed men. The comparisons with the United States suggest that women will experience deterioration in relative earnings as the Australian labour market is deregulated.     

Wage differentials by sector and gender: a quantile analysis for the Spanish case

This paper analyses existing wage differentials between workers in the public and private sectors and by gender in Spain. This analysis is run throughout the entire earnings distribution and observed wage differentials are decomposed into a part explained by differences in productive characteristics and a part due to differences in returns to such characteristics. Our results show that public sector workers tend to earn higher wages than private employees, although most of this sector wage gap is due to better public workers’ productive characteristics. A wage premium in favour of men is also found in both the public and private sectors, with the gender wage gap greater at the top of the earnings distribution.     

Gender,Work Burden,and Mental Health in Post-Reform China

ABSTRACT

This study investigates how total work burden, including paid work and unpaid care work, affects the mental health of prime-age, employed women and men in urban China. Based on the 2010 China Family Panel Studies (CFPS), regression results indicate that total work burden is negatively related to the mental health of both men and women, consistent with the idea that additional work hours reduce time available for rest and leisure. Women have longer working hours and are more likely to be time poor than men, and this gender inequality in total work burden contributes to the gender gap in mental health. The relationships between the components of total work burden – paid and unpaid work – and mental health shed further light on the strength of gender norms and the barriers to redistribution of unpaid work from women to men necessary to reduce the gender gap in mental health.     

Deindustrialization in the UK: a comparison analysis with Japan

As a mature economy, the UK has experienced continuous decline in manufacturing competitiveness under the process of deindustrialization. On the other hand, the service sector has been developing a comparative advantage and creating new jobs. This article attempts to recognize the change in inter-dependence between industries, particularly the manufacturing and service sectors, in the process of deindustrialization. Using partitioned multiplier effects, I analyse the extent to which deindustrialization, particularly expansion in the service sector, has benefited the UK economy. I show that the contribution of the service sector to the UK economy has not been significant.     

Unions and wage inequality: The roles of gender,skill and public sector employment

We examine the changing relationship between unionization and wage inequality in Canada and the United States. Our study is motivated by profound recent changes in the composition of the unionized workforce. Historically, union jobs were concentrated among low-skilled men in private sector industries. With the steady decline in private sector unionization and rising influence in the public sector, half of unionized workers are now in the public sector. Accompanying these changes was a remarkable rise in the share of women among unionized workers. Currently, approximately half of unionized employees in North America are women. While early studies of unions and inequality focused on males, recent studies find that unions reduce wage inequality among men but not among women. In both countries, we find striking differences between the private and public sectors in the effects of unionization on wage inequality. At present, unions reduce economy-wide wage inequality by less than 10%. However, union impacts on wage inequality are much larger in the public sector. Once we disaggregate by sector, the effects of unions on male and female wage inequality no longer differ. The key differences in union impacts are between the public and private sectors—not between males and females.     

Decomposing Gender Wage Differentials Using Quantile Regression: Evidence from the Lebanese Banking Sector

This paper investigates gender pay inequality in the labor market of a developing country. Our empirical investigation uses data derived from a sample of employees in the Lebanese banking sector for the years 2008 and 2014. Using Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition, the results reveal that the unexplained component of the gender wage gap, attributed to discrimination, represents a substantial share of the total gap. A surprising result is that the contribution of human capital to the gender wage gap is negative, suggesting that wage discrimination is the main explanation for the gap. Utilizing the Machado-Mata methodology to decompose the wage gap across the entire wage distribution, our findings indicate that the unexplained component of the raw gender wage gap is more pronounced at the low and middle ranges of the distribution. However, the explained component dominates at the top of the distribution, suggesting that earnings gaps are fully explained by observed characteristics.     

Gender Earnings Differential in Urban China

This study uses survey data collected from five large cities in China to describe and decompose the earnings difference between female and male workers. The results indicate that the main source of lower earnings for females lies in unequal pay within sectors, and that the earnings gap due to differences in sectoral attainment is relatively small. The results also reveal that most of the gender earnings differential is attributable to sex discrimination rather than to the gender difference in the endowment of human capital. Therefore, eliminating discrimination against females within individual sectors is effective in narrowing the gender earnings gap.     

The Role of Gender in Further Training for Spanish Workers: Are Employers Making a Difference?

This paper investigates whether gender differentials in three categories of nonformal educational training that exist among Spanish employees – firm-financed training, public-financed training, and self-financed training – using the Survey on Adult Population Involvement in Learning Activities (AES), conducted in 2011. Although this study finds no gender gap in the probability of overall training participation, there is a negative gap in firm-financed training for women. Since this study does not detect differential preferences for training between Spanish women and men employees, gender discrimination in access to firm-financed training is at the root of this gender gap. While this discrimination does not extend to training returns among employees who take part in firm-financed courses, taking part in such training increases the probability of obtaining a salary increase or promotion, and it is discrimination in the access to firm-financed training that leaves Spanish women employees at a disadvantage.     

Wage Differentials between the State and Private Sectors in Moscow

In this study the 1997 Russian Labor Force Survey is used to investigate wage differentials between the state and the private sector in the city of Moscow. Our analysis demonstrates that substantial differences exist between private and state sector wages. We estimate the gap between private and state sector wages to be 14.3 percent for men and 18.3 percent for women. We also find gender differences in wages. Men in the private sector earn on average 23.7 percent more than women. The gender wage gap in the state sector is even higher at 32.5 percent. In the state sector, wages for both men and women increase as years of tenure increase. But in the private sector this is only true for men; women earn no return to tenure. The probability of employment in the private sector decreases with age and tenure.     

The public–private sector gender wage differential in Britain: evidence from matched employee-workplace data

This article shows that little of the gender earnings gap in the public and private sectors in Britain are explained by differences in employee characteristics. The differences in workplace characteristics, however, make a significant, sizeable contribution. It is shown that performance related pay and company pension schemes are associated with higher relative earnings in the private sector, whilst increased provision of family-friendly employment practices in the public sector is associated with higher relative earnings for women.     

Labour market institutions,crisis and gender earnings gap in Eastern Europe

We study gender pay inequality in ten Central and Eastern EU countries before (2007) and during the economic crisis (2009) using quantile regression methods. The analysis reveals remarkable cross‐country diversity in levels and patterns of the gender gap along the earnings distribution; for the majority of the countries the crisis is associated with declining male/female disparities. We address the role played by labour market institutions in shaping the observed gender pay gap levels and patterns. Labour market deregulation increases gender inequality at the middle and at the top of the pay distribution, but reduces disparities at the bottom. Higher union density and wage coordination reduce the pay gap, with stronger equalizing effects on better‐paid jobs. The crisis seems to weaken the already poor role of institutions in the low‐pay sector.     

Unpaid Care Work's Interference with Paid Work and the Gender Earnings Gap in China

This paper examines the effects of unpaid care work on the earnings of men and women in China by using data from the 2008 China Time Use Survey, the country's first, large-scale time-use survey. The study introduces three indicators to measure the degree to which unpaid care work may “interfere” with paid work, either by directly disrupting it or by being intertwined with it. The regression estimates show that while the amount of time spent on unpaid care work negatively affects the earnings of both men and women, the interference of unpaid work with paid work lowers earnings more for women than for men. Quantitatively, the gender differences in the time spent on unpaid care work and its interference with paid work account for 28 percent of the gender earnings gap in China.     

The evolution of male-female earnings differentials in Canadian universities,1970–2001

Abstract .  The evolution of academic salaries and the gender earnings gap in Canadian universities is analysed using a unique Statistics Canada data set containing detailed information on all full-time teachers at Canadian universities over the period 1970 through 2001. Male salaries declined across cohorts, while female salaries remained stable; consequently, male-female earnings differentials have narrowed. Recent years have also seen increasing variation in academic salaries for both men and women. A gender earnings gap remains, the bulk of which can be explained by differences in men's and women's rank and field. The unexplained earnings gap has decreased over time.     

Educational Attainment and the Gender Wage Gap: A Comparison of Young Men and Women in 1984 and 2007

This study pools data from two sources to investigate the role of educational attainment in determining the gender wage gap. The empirical analysis reveals that the returns to education remained largely unchanged for young men but declined significantly for young women over the period 1984–2007. We find significant evidence of a decline in the returns to a Bachelor's degree for young women as well as evidence of increasing wage inequality over time among young men and women with a Bachelor's degree. Also, in 2007, the gender wage gap between young men and women was largest for those with a Bachelor's degree. Further, our analysis suggests that young women with a college education may confront more discrimination in the labor market than young women without a college education. We conclude that promoting educational attainment among young women may be a necessary but not sufficient condition for addressing the gender wage gap.     

Gender Wage Gap: Some Recent Evidences from India

Gender wage inequality is a chronic socioeconomic malice in developed as well as in developing countries. This paper describes the outcomes of our study on the estimation of gender wage gap in the Indian labour market, using the 68th Round NSSO employment–unemployment data. The study uses Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition technique and Heckman two-step methodology, for removal of selectivity bias in the sample data, to measure the components of total gender wage gap, viz. (1) occupational segregation (explained by economic rationale) and (2) direct discrimination (not explained by economic rationale). The analysis indicates that the maximum direct discrimination is for job-related factors, such as industry type which are controlled by employers. The majority of the Indian employers today are men, which may be the reason for the insensitivity to the chronic direct discrimination against women in workplaces. The study also indicates that most of the explained gender wage gap is due to lower skill and experience amongst women. The findings suggest that besides labour law reforms for ensuring gender neutrality in workplaces, focused government policies for promoting women entrepreneurship and skill development of women are urgently required for reducing the gender wage gap in India.