Occupational segregation, selection effects and gender wage differences: evidence from urban Colombia

This paper assesses the effects of occupational segregation on the gender wage gap in urban Colombia between 1986 and 2000. The empirical methodology involves a two-step procedure whereby the occupational distributions of workers by gender are modelled using a multinomial logit model in the first stage. In the second stage, the multinomial logit estimates are used not only to derive a counterfactual occupational distribution of women in the absence of workplace discrimination but also to correct for selectivity bias in the wage equations for each occupational category using the procedure suggested by . Besides the explained and unexplained components in conventional decompositions of the gender wage gap, this methodology differentiates between the justified and unjustified effects of the gender allocation of workers across occupational categories. The results for urban Colombia indicate that controlling for selectivity bias at the occupational category level is found to be relevant in all years reviewed in this study. They also suggest that a changing composition of the female labour supply in terms of unobservables (i.e., ability and motivation) is playing a role in the dramatic reduction of the observed wage gap.

SERIE DE DOCUMENTOS EN ECONOMÍA Y …, 2010

Downloadable! This paper assesses the effects of occupational segregation on the gender wage gap in urban Colombia between 1986 and 2000. The empirical methodology involves a two-step procedure whereby the occupational distributions of workers by gender are modelled ...

This paper examines the evolution of horizontal gender segregation by occupation in the urban labour markets of Colombia between 1986 and 2004. In addition to the conventional Dissimilarity Index suggested by , other measures of horizontal occupational segregation are also computed. These are the Gini coefficient of the distribution of jobs by gender and the Karmel and MacLachlan (1988) index of labour market segregation. Overall the results indicate that gender-based occupational segregation in urban Colombia has exhibited a statistically significant reduction over the period under review. This reduction has been more marked among formal sector workers while informal employment persists in being more gender segregated than its formal counterpart. There is also evidence that most of the reduction in the formal sector is explained by a compositional change within occupations performed by workers with university education.

2012

In this paper we show the importance of subject of degree in explaining the gender wage gap in Colombia. In order to minimize the influence of gender differences in experience, promotions, and job changes on the wage gap, we focus on college graduates who have a formal job and who have been in the labor market at most one year. Using unique, administrative datasets with detailed subjects of degree, we find that the wage gap against women is on average 11% and that 40% of it can be explained by differences in subject of degree. Using a distributional decomposition, we find an increasing gender wage gap across the distribution of wages (from 2% at the bottom to 15% at the top), although subject of degree explains a lower 30% of the gap at the top. Policies designed to reduce the gender wage gap need to address the differing gender educational choices and the factors that influence them. These policies would be more effective in reducing the gap for median wage earners.

Labour, 2006

Using 19 years of cross-section wage data, we look at the trend of the ratio of male to female wages in Colombia. First, we observe a long-term trend towards an increase in the gender wage gap that may be related to new labor regulations giving more protection to women and thereby raising the cost of female employment for firms. Second, we measure the impact on poverty of the increasing gap by producing estimates of the income distribution for the subsequent years had the wage gap remained at the low level it used to be in the early 1990s. As mainly low-skilled women suffered from the increase in the wage gap, we find that the phenomenon contributed to an overall increase in poverty during the decade.

Notas Económicas, 2009

The study analyzes the role of occupational distribution in explaining the male-female wage gap in the Portuguese economy. The objective is to investigate to what extent gender wage disparities can be explained by occupational segregation. Relying on data from the personnel records for the period 1986-2004, this study uses the Brown, Moon, and Zoloth (1989) wage differential decomposition method to conduct the empirical analysis. The main findings reveal that occupational gender segregation is not a major contributor to the male-female wage gap and that within occupational wage effects play a prominent role in determining the overall differential. Additionally, the results indicate that a substantial portion of wage differentials within occupations potentially stems from wage discrimination.

The existence of wage differentials across sectors is a widely observed phenomenon. This paper provides new elements for understanding inter-and intra-sectoral wage differentials in Colombia by analysing a wage-setting survey of 1,305 firms and by emphasizing the role of firm characteristics. A descriptive analysis of the survey confirms the existence of substantial wage differentials across sectors and occupational positions in the country. We found positive wage differentials with respect to the average for the different occupational groups in the electricity, gas, water and mining sector, financial services and the manufacturing sector, and strong negative wage differentials in agriculture, forestry and fishing. When analysing the wage differential within each occupational group, higher wage dispersion is observed in the case of managers, followed by professionals. The lower wage dispersion for the least qualified jobs could be associated with the existence of a minimum wage in Colombia. We also estimate cross-section models for each occupational group and sector to account for the importance of firm characteristics in explaining wage differentials.

2002

http://www.iadb.org/sds/soc Foreword Gender-based occupational segregation is one of the most important factors contributing to inequality between men and women in labor markets around the world. Despite the importance of occupational segregation as a barrier to improved equity and efficiency in la bor markets, there has been relatively little research done on the topic for Latin America and the Caribbean. What makes this study particularly relevant is that Latin America has the dubious distinction of being the region with the highest level of occupational segregation in the world. In this context, this study poses four important questions. Has occupational segregation by sex decreased in the 1990s? Can we expect occupational segregation to decline as economic development occurs? To what extent does gender segregation explain the male -female wage gap? Are gender differences in employment opportunities especially injurious to poorly educated women, or are all women equally affected? By analyzing each of these questions, this study of gender-based occupational segregation in three countries of Latin America -Costa Rica, Ecuador and Uruguay -constitutes valuable reference material for policy-makers, researchers and activists interested in the advancement of equality between men and women.

Equidad y Desarrollo

This paper examines the evolution of gender segregation indexes by occupation in the urban labour markets of Colombia between 1986 and 2004 and presents a decomposition of their changes over time using a technique proposed by Deutsch et al. (2006). We find that a substantial proportion of the reduction in segregation indexes for this country is driven by changes in both, the employment structure of occupations and the increasing female labour participation observed over these years while changes in the gender composition of occupations have favoured mainly government employees and those with university education