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What drives the gender wage gap? Examining the roles of sorting, productivity differences, and discrimination

Author

Listed:
  • Isabelle Sin

    () (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research)

  • Steven Stillman

    () (Free University of Bozen Bolzano)

  • Richard Fabling

    () (Independent Researcher)

Abstract

As in other OECD countries, women in New Zealand earn substantially less than men with similar observable characteristics. In this paper, we use a decade of annual wage and productivity data from New Zealand’s Linked Employer-Employee Database to examine different explanations for this gender wage gap. Sorting by gender at either the industry or firm level explains less than one-fifth of the overall wage gap. Gender differences in productivity within firms also explain little of the difference seen in wages. The relationships between the gender wage-productivity gap and both age and tenure are inconsistent with statistical discrimination being an important explanatory factor for the remaining differences in wages. Relating across industry and over time variation in the gender wage-productivity gap to industry-year variation in worker skills, and product market and labour market competition, we find evidence that is consistent with taste discrimination being important for explaining the overall gender wage gap. Explanations based on gender differences in bargaining power are less consistent with our findings.

Suggested Citation

  • Isabelle Sin & Steven Stillman & Richard Fabling, 2017. "What drives the gender wage gap? Examining the roles of sorting, productivity differences, and discrimination," Working Papers 17_15, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:mtu:wpaper:17_15
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Izaskun Barba & Belen Iraizoz, 2020. "Effect of the Great Crisis on Sectoral Female Employment in Europe: A Structural Decomposition Analysis," Economies, MDPI, Open Access Journal, vol. 8(3), pages 1-24, August.
    2. Richard Fabling & Arthur Grimes, 2019. "Ultra-fast broadband, skill complementarities, gender and wages," Working Papers 19_23, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    3. Isabelle Sin & Bronwyn Bruce-Brand, 2019. "Is the pay of medical specialists in New Zealand gender biased?," Working Papers 19_21, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    4. Bernardo Fanfani, 2018. "Tastes for Discrimination in Monopsonistic Labour Markets," Working papers 054, Department of Economics and Statistics (Dipartimento di Scienze Economico-Sociali e Matematico-Statistiche), University of Torino.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Gender wage gap; discrimination; sorting; productivity; competition;

    JEL classification:

    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • J71 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - Hiring and Firing

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