The Gender Wage Gap among Young Adults in the United States: The Importance of Money versus People

Nicole Fortin

Journal of Human Resources, 2008, vol. 43, issue 4

Abstract: Using two single-cohort longitudinal surveys, the NLS72 and the NELS88, I investigate the impact of four noncognitive traits—self-esteem, external locus of control, the importance of money/work and the importance of people/ family—on wages and on the gender wage gap among these young workers. I find that gender differences in these noncognitive factors, especially the importance of money/work, have a modest but significant role in accounting for the gender wage gap. Methodologically, this paper proposes a correction to the Oaxaca-Blinder-Ransom decomposition that results in a truly decomposable approach compatible with the simple pooled regression that includes a gender dummy.

Date: 2008
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (271)

Downloads: (external link)
http://jhr.uwpress.org/cgi/reprint/43/4/884
A subscription is required to access pdf files. Pay per article is available.

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:uwp:jhriss:v:43:y:2008:i4:p884-918

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Human Resources from University of Wisconsin Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().