IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/108206.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Investigating the gender wealth gap across occupational classes

Author

Listed:
  • Waitkus, Nora
  • Minkus, Lara

Abstract

This study examines the role of occupational class in the Gender Wealth Gap (GWG). Despite rising interest in gender differences in wealth, the central role of occupations in restricting and enabling its accumulation has received less scrutiny thus far. Drawing on the German Socio-economic Panel, we employ quantile regressions and decomposition techniques. We find explanatory power of occupational class for the gender wealth gap, which operates despite accounting for other labour-market-relevant parameters, such as income, tenure, and full-time work experience at all points of the wealth distribution. Wealth gaps by gender vary between and within occupational classes. Particularly, women's under-representation among the self-employed and over-representation among socio-cultural professions explain the GWG. Our study thus adds another dimension of stratification - occupational class - to the discussion of the gendered distribution of wealth.

Suggested Citation

  • Waitkus, Nora & Minkus, Lara, 2021. "Investigating the gender wealth gap across occupational classes," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 108206, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:108206
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/108206/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alyssa Schneebaum & Miriam Rehm & Katharina Mader & Katarina Hollan, 2018. "The Gender Wealth Gap Across European Countries," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 64(2), pages 295-331, June.
    2. Mariacristina De Nardi & Giulio Fella, 2017. "Saving and Wealth Inequality," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 26, pages 280-300, October.
    3. Erik Bihagen & Marita Ohls, 2007. "Are women over-represented in dead-end jobs? A Swedish study using empirically derived measures of dead-end jobs," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 84(2), pages 159-177, November.
    4. Sierminska, Eva & Piazzalunga, Daniela & Grabka, Markus M., 2018. "Transitioning towards more equality? Wealth gender differences and the changing role of explanatory factors over time," GLO Discussion Paper Series 252, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    5. Frank A Cowell & Eleni Karagiannaki & Abigail McKnight, 2012. "Mapping and measuring the distribution of household wealth: A cross-country analysis," CASE Papers case165, Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE.
    6. Julie A. Nelson, 2016. "Not-So-Strong Evidence for Gender Differences in Risk Taking," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(2), pages 114-142, April.
    7. Frank Cowell & Karagiannaki, E. (Eleni) & Abigail Mcknight, 2012. "GINI DP 71: Mapping and Measuring the Distribution of Household Wealth: A Cross-Country Analysis," GINI Discussion Papers 71, AIAS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies.
    8. Fortin, Nicole & Lemieux, Thomas & Firpo, Sergio, 2011. "Decomposition Methods in Economics," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 1, pages 1-102, Elsevier.
    9. Francine D. Blau & Lawrence M. Kahn, 2017. "The Gender Wage Gap: Extent, Trends, and Explanations," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 55(3), pages 789-865, September.
    10. Oaxaca, Ronald, 1973. "Male-Female Wage Differentials in Urban Labor Markets," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 14(3), pages 693-709, October.
    11. Siobhan Austen & Therese Jefferson & Rachel Ong, 2014. "The Gender Gap in Financial Security: What We Know and Don't Know about Australian Households," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(3), pages 25-52, July.
    12. Lena Edlund & Wojciech Kopczuk, 2009. "Women, Wealth, and Mobility," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 146-178, March.
    13. repec:cep:sticas:/165 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Alexis Yamokoski & Lisa Keister, 2006. "The Wealth Of Single Women: Marital Status And Parenthood In The Asset Accumulation Of Young Baby Boomers In The United States," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(1-2), pages 167-194.
    15. Alan S. Blinder, 1973. "Wage Discrimination: Reduced Form and Structural Estimates," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 8(4), pages 436-455.
    16. Lara Minkus, 2019. "Labor Market Closure and the Stalling of the Gender Pay Gap," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 1049, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    17. Lena Edlund & Wojciech Kopczuk, 2009. "Corrigendum: Women, Wealth, and Mobility," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 1082-1082, June.
    18. Eva M. Sierminska & Joachim R. Frick & Markus M. Grabka, 2010. "Examining the gender wealth gap," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 62(4), pages 669-690, October.
    19. Marianne Bertrand & Kevin F. Hallock, 2001. "The Gender Gap in Top Corporate Jobs," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 55(1), pages 3-21, October.
    20. Markus M. Grabka & Christoph Halbmeier, 2019. "Vermögensungleichheit in Deutschland bleibt trotz deutlich steigender Nettovermögen anhaltend hoch," DIW Wochenbericht, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 86(40), pages 735-745.
    21. Bruno Palier & Kathleen Thelen, 2010. "Institutionalizing Dualism: Complementarities and Change in France and Germany," Politics & Society, , vol. 38(1), pages 119-148, March.
    22. Willaim G. Gale & Karen M. Pence, 2006. "Are Successive Generations Getting Wealthier, and If So, Why?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 37(1), pages 155-234.
    23. Julie A. Nelson, 2015. "Are Women Really More Risk-Averse Than Men? A Re-Analysis Of The Literature Using Expanded Methods," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(3), pages 566-585, July.
    24. Laura Ravazzini & Jenny Chesters, 2018. "Inequality and Wealth: Comparing the Gender Wealth Gap in Switzerland and Australia," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(4), pages 83-107, October.
    25. Tracey Warren, 2006. "Moving Beyond The Gender Wealth Gap: On Gender, Class, Ethnicity, And Wealth Inequalities In The United Kingdom," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(1-2), pages 195-219.
    26. Erin Ruel & Robert Hauser, 2013. "Explaining the Gender Wealth Gap," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 50(4), pages 1155-1176, August.
    27. Sergio Firpo & Nicole M. Fortin & Thomas Lemieux, 2009. "Unconditional Quantile Regressions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 953-973, May.
    28. Robert W. Fairlie & Harry A. Krashinsky, 2012. "Liquidity Constraints, Household Wealth, And Entrepreneurship Revisited," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 58(2), pages 279-306, June.
    29. Christina Boll, 2011. "Mind the gap—German motherhood risks in figures and game theory issues," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 8(4), pages 363-382, December.
    30. Joachim R. Frick & Markus M. Grabka & Jan Marcus, 2010. "Editing und Multiple Imputation der Vermögensinformation 2002 und 2007 im SOEP," Data Documentation 51, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    31. Bewley, Truman, 1977. "The permanent income hypothesis: A theoretical formulation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 252-292, December.
    32. Markus Grabka & Jan Marcus & Eva Sierminska, 2015. "Wealth distribution within couples," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 13(3), pages 459-486, September.
    33. Ben Jann, 2008. "The Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition for linear regression models," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 8(4), pages 453-479, December.
    34. Bijan J. Borah & Anirban Basu, 2013. "Highlighting Differences Between Conditional And Unconditional Quantile Regression Approaches Through An Application To Assess Medication Adherence," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(9), pages 1052-1070, September.
    35. Goebel Jan & Grabka Markus M. & Liebig Stefan & Kroh Martin & Richter David & Schröder Carsten & Schupp Jürgen, 2019. "The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP)," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 239(2), pages 345-360, April.
    36. Ganzeboom, H.B.G. & de Graaf, P.M. & Treiman, D.J. & de Leeuw, J., 1992. "A standard international socio-economic index of occupational status," WORC Paper 92.01.001/1, Tilburg University, Work and Organization Research Centre.
    37. Carmen Diana Deere & Cheryl Doss, 2006. "The Gender Asset Gap: What Do We Know And Why Does It Matter?," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(1-2), pages 1-50.
    38. Markus M. Grabka & Christian Westermeier, 2014. "Persistently High Wealth Inequality in Germany," DIW Economic Bulletin, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 4(6), pages 3-15.
    39. Gale, William & Pence, Karen, 2006. "Are Successive Generations Getting Wealthier, and If So, Why?Evidence from the 1990s," MPRA Paper 55502, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    40. Fabian T. Pfeffer & Nora Waitkus, 2020. "The Wealth Inequality of Nations," LWS Working papers 33, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    41. Daniel Lechmann & Claus Schnabel, 2012. "Why is there a gender earnings gap in self-employment? A decomposition analysis with German data," IZA Journal of European Labor Studies, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 1(1), pages 1-25, December.
    42. N Mohan & J Ruggiero, 2003. "Compensation differences between male and female CEOs for publicly traded firms: a nonparametric analysis," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 54(12), pages 1242-1248, December.
    43. Renate Schubert, 1999. "Financial Decision-Making: Are Women Really More Risk-Averse?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(2), pages 381-385, May.
    44. Sunden, Annika E & Surette, Brian J, 1998. "Gender Differences in the Allocation of Assets in Retirement Savings Plans," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 207-211, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Philipp M. Lersch & Emanuela Struffolino & Agnese Vitali, 2022. "Wealth in Couples: Introduction to the Special Issue," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 38(4), pages 623-641, October.
    2. Nicolas Frémeaux & Marion Leturcq, 2022. "Wealth Accumulation and the Gender Wealth Gap Across Couples’ Legal Statuses and Matrimonial Property Regimes in France," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 38(4), pages 643-679, October.
    3. Tisch, Daria & Schechtl, Manuel, 2023. "The Gender (Tax) Gap in Parental Transfers. Evidence from Administrative Inheritance and Gift Tax Data," SocArXiv kfetw, Center for Open Science.
    4. Oaxaca, Ronald L. & Sierminska, Eva, 2023. "Oaxaca-Blinder Meets Kitagawa: What Is the Link?," IZA Discussion Papers 16188, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sierminska, Eva & Piazzalunga, Daniela & Grabka, Markus M., 2018. "Transitioning towards more equality? Wealth gender differences and the changing role of explanatory factors over time," GLO Discussion Paper Series 252, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    2. Jaanika Meriküll & Merike Kukk & Tairi Rõõm, 2021. "What explains the gender gap in wealth? Evidence from administrative data," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 501-547, June.
    3. Karla Cordova & Markus M. Grabka & Eva Sierminska, 2022. "Pension Wealth and the Gender Wealth Gap," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 38(4), pages 755-810, October.
    4. Anglade, Boaz & Useche, Pilar & Deere, Carmen Diana, 2017. "Decomposing the Gender Wealth Gap in Ecuador," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 19-31.
    5. Jaanika Meriküll & Merike Kukk & Tairi Rõõm, 2021. "What explains the gender gap in wealth? Evidence from administrative data," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 501-547, June.
    6. Alyssa Schneebaum & Miriam Rehm & Katharina Mader & Katarina Hollan, 2018. "The Gender Wealth Gap Across European Countries," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 64(2), pages 295-331, June.
    7. Markus Grabka & Jan Marcus & Eva Sierminska, 2015. "Wealth distribution within couples," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 13(3), pages 459-486, September.
    8. Julia Groiß & Alsyssa Schneebaum & Barbara Schuster, 2017. "Vermögensunterschiede nach Geschlecht in Österreich und Deutschland: Eine Analyse auf der Personenebene," Working Paper Reihe der AK Wien - Materialien zu Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft 168, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik.
    9. Thomas Y. Mathä & Alessandro Porpiglia & Michael Ziegelmeyer, 2014. "Wealth differences across borders and the effect of real estate price dynamics: Evidence from two household surveys," BCL working papers 90, Central Bank of Luxembourg.
    10. GRABKA Markus & MARCUS Jan & SIERMINSKA Eva, 2013. "Wealth distribution within couples and financial decision making," LISER Working Paper Series 2013-02, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    11. Alyssa Schneebaum & Miriam Rehm & Katharina Mader & Patricia Klopf & Katarina Hollan, 2014. "The Gender Wealth Gap in Europe," Department of Economics Working Papers wuwp186, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics.
    12. Mathä, Thomas Y. & Porpiglia, Alessandro & Ziegelmeyer, Michael, 2017. "Household wealth in the euro area: The importance of intergenerational transfers, homeownership and house price dynamics," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 1-12.
    13. Thomas Y. Mathä & Alessandro Porpiglia & Michael Ziegelmeyer, 2018. "Wealth differences across borders and the effect of real estate price dynamics: Evidence from two household surveys," Journal of Income Distribution, Ad libros publications inc., vol. 26(1), pages 1-35, March.
    14. repec:jid:journl:y:2018:v:26:i:3:p:15-49 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Miriam Rehm & Alyssa Schneebaum & Barbara Schuster, 2022. "Intra-Couple Wealth Inequality: What’s Socio-Demographics Got to Do with it?," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 38(4), pages 681-720, October.
    16. Huong Thu Le & Ha Trong Nguyen, 2018. "The evolution of the gender test score gap through seventh grade: new insights from Australia using unconditional quantile regression and decomposition," IZA Journal of Labor Economics, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 7(1), pages 1-42, December.
    17. Giovanni D�Alessio, 2018. "Gender wealth gap in Italy," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 433, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    18. Julia Groiß & Alyssa Schneebaum & Barbara Schuster, 2018. "Vermögensunterschiede nach Geschlecht in Österreich," Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft - WuG, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik, vol. 44(1), pages 45-72.
    19. Nathan Blascak & Anna Tranfaglia, 2021. "Decomposing Gender Differences in Bankcard Credit Limits," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021-072, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    20. Nolan, Anne & Whelan, Adele & McGuinness, Seamus & Maître, Bertrand, 2019. "Gender, pensions and income in retirement," Research Series, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), number RS87, June.
    21. Briel, Stephanie & Osikominu, Aderonke & Pfeifer, Gregor & Reutter, Mirjam & Satlukal, Sascha, 2020. "Overconfidence and Gender Differences in Wage Expectations," IZA Discussion Papers 13517, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    gender wealth gap; inequality; gender; wealth; occupational class;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R14 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Land Use Patterns
    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General
    • N0 - Economic History - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:108206. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.