Do Women Avoid Salary Negotiations? Evidence from a Large Scale Natural Field Experiment

Andreas Leibbrandt and John List

No 18511, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: One explanation advanced for the persistent gender pay differences in labor markets is that women avoid salary negotiations. By using a natural field experiment that randomizes nearly 2,500 job-seekers into jobs that vary important details of the labor contract, we are able to observe both the nature of sorting and the extent of salary negotiations. We observe interesting data patterns. For example, we find that when there is no explicit statement that wages are negotiable, men are more likely to negotiate than women. However, when we explicitly mention the possibility that wages are negotiable, this difference disappears, and even tends to reverse. In terms of sorting, we find that men in contrast to women prefer job environments where the 'rules of wage determination' are ambiguous. This leads to the gender gap being much more pronounced in jobs that leave negotiation of wage ambiguous.

JEL-codes: C93 J0 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem, nep-exp, nep-hrm, nep-lab, nep-lma and nep-ltv
Note: LS
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (42)

Published as Andreas Leibbrandt & John A. List, 2015. "Do Women Avoid Salary Negotiations? Evidence from a Large-Scale Natural Field Experiment," Management Science, vol 61(9), pages 2016-2024.

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Journal Article: Do Women Avoid Salary Negotiations? Evidence from a Large-Scale Natural Field Experiment (2015)
Working Paper: Do women avoid salary negotiations? Evidence from a large-scale natural field experiment (2012)
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