Gender and Work-Life Balance
The pay gap between men and women, although declining, remains substantial. In our research we have tried to understand its causes, and why it has varied over time and across countries. Amongst our major research findings in this area are:
- The gender pay gap is smallest in Southern Europe but this is because the employment rate for women is low and it is mainly high-skilled women who work. In "Unequal Pay or Unequal Employment? A Cross-country Analysis of Gender Gaps" [Full document in Adobe PDF] CEP Discussion Paper 711, December 2005, Barbara Petrongolo and Claudia Olivetti estimate the gender pay across countries correcting for this fact.
Contact Barbara Petrongolo, email b.petrongolo@lse.ac.uk, for more details.
- The pay gap between full-time and part-time women in the UK is now larger than the gap between full-time women and men. In "The Part-Time Pay Penalty"
[Full document in Adobe PDF] CEP Discussion Paper 697, July 2005, Alan Manning and Barbara Petrongolo show that this is mainly explained by occupational segregation. However, women moving from full-time to part-time work often make downward occupation moves.
Contact Barbara Petrongolo, email b.petrongolo@lse.ac.uk, for more details.
- It has recently been argued that psychological differences between men and women, and resulting differences in behavior in the labor market contribute to the gender pay gap. But are these effects important?. In "The Gender Gap in Early Career Wage Growth" [Full document in Adobe PDF] CEP Discussion Paper 700, July 2005, Alan Manning and Joanna Swaffield investigate this hypothesis finding it has little explanatory power.
Contact Alan Manning, email a.manning@lse.ac.uk, for more details.
Recent publications in this area:
- Alan Manning and Barbara Petrongolo "The part-time pay penalty for women in Britain," The Economic Journal, 118: F28-F51, 2008.
- Alan Manning and Joanna Swaffield "The Gender Gap in Early-Career Wage Growth," The Economic Journal, 2008, forthcoming.
