Monday 20 May 2024 12:00 - 13:30

SAL 1.04, 1st Floor Conference Room, Sir Arthur Lewis Building, LSE, 32 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London WC2A 3PH

About this event

This paper combines personnel records of the U.S. federal government with census data to study how shocks to the gender composition of an organization can persistently shift the gender norms. We exploit city-by-department variation in the sudden expansion of female clerical employment driven by America's entrance into World War I, and find that daughters of civil servants exposed to female co-workers are more likely to work later in life, command higher income, and have fewer children. The effects are driven by exposed fathers and daughters in their teenage years at the time of exposure. We also show that cities exposed to a larger increase in female federal workers saw persistently higher female labor force participation in the public sector, as well as modest increases in private sector labor force participation. Collectively, the results are thus consistent with both the vertical and horizontal transmission of gender norms, and highlight how increasing gender representation within an organization can have broader labor market implications.

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Directions

This event will take place in SAL 1.04, 1st Floor Conference Room, Sir Arthur Lewis Building, LSE, 32 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London WC2A 3PH.

This series is part of the CEP's Labour Markets programme.