Public/private sector wage differentials in Canada-evidence from the 1991 and 1982 surveys of consumer finance

David Prescott and Bo Wandschneider

Applied Economics, 1999, vol. 31, issue 6, 723-731

Abstract: This paper extends the work of Gunderson and Shapiro and Stelcner that considered wage differentials between public and private sector workers in Canada using the 1971 and 1981 Censuses, respectively. Here the Survey of Consumer Finances from 1991 and 1982 is used, which allows for better distinction between public and private sector workers. The estimated public sector premium is decomposed into an endowments component and a residual term. Estimates are corrected for sample selection bias with respect to the choice between full-time and part-time work in the two sectors. Tests for bias caused by self-selection into the private and public sectors revealed no such bias. As a benchmark, the overall wage premium calculated for 1981 compares very well with that of Shapiro and Stelcner. During the 1980s no significant increases in the public sector wage premium for males are found but the female premium increased significantly. This may be due to changes in pay equity legislation in the public sector relative to the private sector.

Date: 1999
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/000368499323931 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:taf:applec:v:31:y:1999:i:6:p:723-731

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RAEC20

DOI: 10.1080/000368499323931

Access Statistics for this article

Applied Economics is currently edited by Anita Phillips

More articles in Applied Economics from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().