Gender-Biased Technological Change: Milking Machines and the Exodus of Women from Farming

Philipp Ager, Marc Goñi and Kjell G Salvanes

American Economic Review, 2026, vol. 116, issue 1, 246-86

Abstract: This paper studies how gender-biased technological change in agriculture affected women's work in twentieth-century Norway. In the 1950s, dairy farms began widely adopting milking machines to replace milking cows by hand, a task typically performed by young women. We show that the machines pushed rural young women in dairy-intensive areas out of farming. The displaced women moved to cities where they acquired more education and found better-paying, skilled employment. Our results suggest that the adoption of milking machines broke up allocative inefficiencies associated with moving costs across sectors, which improved the economic status of women relative to men.

JEL-codes: J16 J24 J43 J61 N34 N54 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
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Related works:
Working Paper: Gender-Biased Technological Change: Milking Machines and the Exodus of Woman From Farming (2024)
Working Paper: Gender-biased technological change: Milking machines and the exodus of women from farming (2023)
Working Paper: Gender-biased technological change: Milking machines and the exodus of women from farming (2023)
Working Paper: Gender-Biased Technological Change: Milking Machines and the Exodus of Women from Farming (2023)
Working Paper: Gender-Biased Technological Change: Milking Machines and the Exodus of Women from Farming (2023)
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DOI: 10.1257/aer.20240167

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