Ownership-related Wage Differentials by Occupation in Vietnamese Manufacturing

This paper examines wage differentials for four types of workers employed by mediumlarge (20 or more employees) wholly-foreign multinational enterprises (WFs), joint-venture multinationals (JVs), state-owned enterprises (SOEs), and domestic private firms in Vietnamese manufacturing in 2009. When all sample firms were combined, unconditional JVprivate and WF-private wage differentials were 106-124 percent for managers, 78-87 percent for professionals and technicians, 56-68 percent for clerical and support workers, and 22-48 percent for production workers. Corresponding, conditional wage differentials which account for the influences of worker education and sex, in addition to firm capital intensity and size, were positive and usually significant, but smaller, 72-78 percent for managers, 32-36 percent for professionals and technicians, 23-28 percent for clerical and support workers and 15-16 percent for production workers. SOE-private differentials were all much smaller. When estimated at the industry-level, conditional WF-private differentials were positive and significant for most occupations and industries. JV-private differentials were also positive and significant in most industries for highly paid managers or professionals and technicians, but not for lowly paid clerical and support workers or production workers. Most SOE-private differentials were also insignificant when estimated at the industry level. In short, there was a strong tendency for MNE-private differentials to be larger for managers than for professionals and technicians, and a somewhat weaker tendency for differentials to be larger for professionals and technicians than for clerical and support workers.