Subject of degree and the gender wage differential

Evidence from the UK and Germany

authored by

Stephen Machin, Patrick A. Puhani

Abstract

We show that controlling for subject of degree explains a significant part of the male/female gender wage differential amongst graduates. Using data from the labour force surveys of the United Kingdom and Germany, we find similar results in these two countries: Subject of degree explains about 2-4% higher wages of male over female graduates after controlling for age, industry, region, part-time and public sector employment. This is a significant part (between 8 and 20%) of the overall male/female gender wage gap, and an even larger amount of the part explained by factors entered into wage equations (at around 24-30% of the explained component).

External Organisation(s)

University College London (UCL)
London School of Economics and Political Science
University of St. Gallen (HSG)
University of Michigan

Type

Article

Journal

Economics letters

Volume

79

Pages

393-400

No. of pages

8

ISSN

0165-1765

Publication date

01.06.2003

Publication status

Published

Peer reviewed

Yes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Finance, Economics and Econometrics

Sustainable Development Goals

SDG 5 - Gender Equality

Electronic version(s)

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0165-1765(03)00027-2 (Access: Closed)
https://econpapers.repec.org/RePEc:iza:izadps:dp553 (Access: Open)