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Pay Transparency and the Gender Gap

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Baker

    (University of Toronto)

  • Yosh Halberstam

    (University of Toronto)

  • Kory Kroft

    (University of Toronto)

  • Alexandre Mas

    (Princeton University)

  • Derek Messacar

    (Statistics Canada)

Abstract

We examine the impact of public sector salary disclosure laws on university faculty salaries in Canada. The laws, which enable public access to the salaries of individual faculty if they exceed specified thresholds, were introduced in different provinces at different times. Using detailed administrative data covering the majority of faculty in Canada, and an event-study research design that exploits within-province variation in exposure to the policy across institutions and academic departments, we find robust evidence that that the laws reduced the gender pay gap between men and women by approximately 30 percent. There is suggestive evidence that higher female salaries contributed to the narrowing of the gender gap. The reduction in the gender gap is primarily in universities where faculty are unionized.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Baker & Yosh Halberstam & Kory Kroft & Alexandre Mas & Derek Messacar, 2019. "Pay Transparency and the Gender Gap," Working Papers 2019-5, Princeton University. Economics Department..
  • Handle: RePEc:pri:econom:2019-5
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Shuai Chen & Jan C. van Ours, 2022. "Mental health effects of same‐sex marriage legalization," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(1), pages 42-56, January.
    2. Gamage, Danula K. & Kavetsos, Georgios & Mallick, Sushanta & Sevilla, Almudena, 2020. "Pay Transparency Initiative and Gender Pay Gap: Evidence from Research-Intensive Universities in the UK," IZA Discussion Papers 13635, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Emma Duchini & Stefania Simion & Arthur Turrell & Jack Blundell, 2020. "Pay Transparency and Gender Equality," Papers 2006.16099, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2022.
    4. René Böheim & Sarah Gust, 2022. "The Austrian Pay Transparency Law and the Gender Wage Gap," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 23(02), pages 25-28, March.
    5. Bönke, Timm & Glaubitz, Rick & Göbler, Konstantin & Harnack, Astrid & Pape, Astrid & Wetter, Miriam, 2020. "Die Entwicklung und Prognose von Lebenserwerbseinkommen in Deutschland," Discussion Papers 2020/5, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    6. Jones, Melanie K. & Kaya, Ezgi, 2022. "Organisational Gender Pay Gaps in the UK: What Happened Post-transparency?," IZA Discussion Papers 15342, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Srikant Devaraj & Pankaj C. Patel, 2022. "State bans on pay secrecy and earnings: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 60(4), pages 697-734, December.
    8. Jochem, Torsten & Rajamani, Anjana, 2020. "Why Have CEO Pay Levels Become Less Diverse?," CEPR Discussion Papers 15523, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    9. Andreas Gulyas & Sebastian Seitz & Sourav Sinha, 2020. "Does Pay Transparency Affect the Gender Wage Gap? Evidence From Austria," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2020_194v1, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    10. Azmat, Ghazala & Boring, Anne, 2020. "Gender Diversity in Firms," IZA Policy Papers 168, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Cruz, Gabriel & Rau, Tomás, 2022. "The effects of equal pay laws on firm pay premiums: Evidence from Chile," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    12. Flynn, James, 2022. "Salary disclosure and individual effort: Evidence from the National Hockey League," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 202(C), pages 471-497.
    13. Barbara Biasi & Heather Sarsons, 2020. "Flexible Wages, Bargaining, and the Gender Gap," NBER Working Papers 27894, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Benjamin Hansen & Drew McNichols, 2020. "Information and the Persistence of the Gender Wage Gap: Early Evidence from California's Salary History Ban," NBER Working Papers 27054, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Wolfgang Frimmel & Bernhard Schmidpeter & Rene Wiesinger & Rudolf Winter-Ebmer, 2022. "Mandatory Wage Posting, Bargaining and the Gender Wage Gap," Economics working papers 2022-02, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    16. Jack Blundell, 2021. "Wage responses to gender pay gap reporting requirements," CEP Discussion Papers dp1750, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    17. Kristoffer Balle Hvidberg & Claus Thustrup Kreiner & Stefanie Stantcheva, 2021. "Social Position and Fairness Views," CESifo Working Paper Series 8928, CESifo.
    18. Kristoffer B. Hvidberg & Claus Kreiner & Stefanie Stantcheva, 2020. "Social Positions and Fairness Views on Inequality," NBER Working Papers 28099, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Morten Bennedsen & Elena Simintzi & Margarita Tsoutsoura & Daniel Wolfenzon, 2022. "Do Firms Respond to Gender Pay Gap Transparency?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(4), pages 2051-2091, August.
    20. Zoë B. Cullen & Ricardo Perez-Truglia, 2018. "The Salary Taboo: Privacy Norms and the Diffusion of Information," NBER Working Papers 25145, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Azmat, Ghazala & Boring, Anne, 2020. "Gender Diversity in Firms," IZA Policy Papers 168, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    22. Blundell, Jack, 2021. "Wage responses to gender pay gap reporting requirements," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 114416, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    23. Duchini, Emma & Simion, Stefania & Turrell, Arthur, 2020. "Pay Transparency and Cracks in the Glass Ceiling," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 1311, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    24. Bamieh, Omar & Ziegler, Lennart, 2022. "Can Wage Transparency Alleviate Gender Sorting in the Labor Market?," IZA Discussion Papers 15363, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Wages; Pay Transparency;

    JEL classification:

    • J0 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General
    • J3 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials

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