Gender salary and promotion gaps in Japanese academia: Results from science and engineering

Using original survey data on Japanese academics in science and engineering, we examined the gender salary and promotion gaps. We found a 6% gender salary gap after controlling for ranks. This gap was unaffected when quality and quantity of publications were controlled for. In contrast, promotion gap disappeared when publication variables were controlled for. We failed to find negative effects of marriage and children on women's salary and promotion, though a positive sorting into motherhood could conceal such negative effects, and we provided suggestive evidence for this. Men and women are equally likely to move to other universities voluntarily, and the salary premiums from these job changes are the same for both genders, suggesting that outside job offers are not responsible for the gender salary gap. Finally, there are substantial gender differences in academic labor market dropout rates, which could lead to underestimation of the gender salary and promotion gaps.