DICE Forum: The Gender Pay Gap

The CESifo Group, consisting of the Center for Economic Studies (CES), the ifo Institute and the CESifo GmbH (Munich Society for the Promotion of Economic Research) is a research group unique in Europe in the area of economic research. It combines the theoretically oriented economic research of the university with the empirical work of a leading Economic research institute and places this combination in an international environment.

The journal ifo DICE Report was called CESifo DICE Report until the end of 2016.Women still earn lower wages than men, on average. The so-called gender pay gap measures the difference between the median full-time earnings of men and women relative to median full-time earnings of men. In recent years this gap has closed in many countries, and government legislation aims to reduce it even further in the future.

Yet there is an ongoing debate over the roots of persistent earnings differentials between men and women and, in turn, over the adequate policy response.

The Forum articles in ifo DICE Report 2 2017 contribute to this discussion by analysing gender differences in labour market outcomes, both from a theoretical as well as an empirical point of view, and by proposing policy measures to effectively address the gender pay gap.

+ Spencer Bastani, Tomer Blumkin and Luca Micheletto argue that parental leave rules can help to alleviate the gender pay gap by enhancing efficiency and decreasing the motherhood penalty on the labour market.

+ Mike Brewer and Sarah Cattan highlight the role of childcare arrangements in reducing the motherhood penalty.

+ René Böheim, Dominik Grübl and Mario Lackner consider the link between risk-taking behaviour, performance and pay for men and women in the labour market.

+ Mario Macis and Mirco Tonin emphasise the role of social norms and women’s occupational choices, in particular related to the gender gap in leadership positions.

+ Nigar Hashimzade and Natalia Vershinina call attention to the role of formal and informal institutions for the self-selection of men and women in entrepreneurial activity and the subsequent business performance.

+ Paola Profeta argues that gender quotas can be an adequate measure to increase the share of females in leadership positions, without imposing too high economic costs.