NAFTA and the Gender Wage Gap

Shushanik Hakobyan and John McLaren
Additional contact information
Shushanik Hakobyan: Fordham University

No 17-270, Upjohn Working Papers from W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research

Abstract: Using U.S. Census data for 1990–2000, we estimate effects of NAFTA on U.S. wages, focusing on differences by gender. We find that NAFTA tariff reductions are associated with substantially reduced wage growth for married blue-collar women, much larger than the effect for other demographic groups. We investigate several possible explanations for this finding. It is not explained by differential sensitivity of female-dominated occupations to trade shocks, or by household bargaining that makes married female workers less able to change their industry of employment than other workers. We find some support for an explanation based on an equilibrium theory of selective non-participation in the labor market, whereby some of the higher-wage married female workers in their industry drop out of the labor market in response to their industry’s loss of tariff. However, this does not fully explain the findings, so we are left with a puzzle.

Keywords: NAFTA; gender wage gap; local labor markets (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F13 F16 J31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-gen, nep-int and nep-lma
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://research.upjohn.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?art ... ext=up_workingpapers (application/pdf)
This material is copyrighted. Permission is required to reproduce any or all parts.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:upj:weupjo:17-270

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Upjohn Working Papers from W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research 300 S. Westnedge Ave. Kalamazoo, MI 49007 USA. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().