Who works for whom and the UK gender pay gap?

Sarah Louise Jewell, Giovanni Razzu, Carl Singleton

Research output: Working paperDiscussion paper

Abstract

This study reports novel facts about the UK gender pay gap. We use a large, longitudinal, representative and employer-employee linked dataset for the years 2002-16. Men’s average log hourly wage was 22 points higher than women’s in this period. We ask how much of this gap is accounted for by the differences in whom men and women worked for; how much is explained by the relative wage premiums that firms paid their employees, after adjusting for the influence of other factors, such as occupations and tenure? The answer is less than 1 percentage point, or about one eighteenth of the adjusted hourly gender pay gap. We also find that the allocation of men and women to occupations was as unimportant as how workers were allocated to firms. These results show that in the United Kingdom what happens within firms and occupations is far more important than what jobs men and women have. Therefore, attention should focus on why men and women within UK firms tend to receive different rates of pay.
Original languageEnglish
PublisherEdinburgh School of Economics Discussion Paper Series
Publication statusPublished - Apr 2018

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • gender wage gap
  • firm-specific wages
  • occupation premiums

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