Individuals, Jobs, and Labor Markets: The Devaluation of Women's Work

Co-authored with Philip N. Cohen

Working for the Woman? Female Managers and the Gender Wage Gap

Co-authored with Philip N. Cohen

Racial Wage Inequality: Job Segregation and Devaluation across U.S. Labor Markets

Co-authored with Philip N. Cohen

Despite decades of research showing greater black-white inequality in local areas where the black population is relatively large, little is known about the mechanisms for this effect. Using a unique data set of individuals nested within jobs across labor markets, this article tests two possible mechanisms for the black concentration effect on wage inequality: job segregation and devaluation. Results show that black population size is associated with greater segregation of black workers into black-dominated jobs. On the other hand, no evidence is found that the penalty for working in a black-dominated job (the devaluation effect) increases as a function of black population size. The article concludes that discrimination against workers—especially exclusion from better-paying jobs—is an important mechanism for the effect of black population size on the racial wage gap.

Gender Inequality across Local Wage Hierarchies

Is gender inequality more severe in higher paying jobs, where there is more at stake? Using a unique definition of jobs—local occupation-industry cells—and multilevel models, I offer the first investigation of how gender wage inequality varies as a function of a job’s ranking in its specific local labor-market context. The results suggest that net of various individual- and job-level controls, (a) female-dominated jobs pay less than comparable male-dominated jobs, (b) the penalty associated with female-dominated jobs is steeper for women, and (c) wage inequality increases as one ascends the wage hierarchy of local labor markets. However, there is no evidence that the tendency for female-dominated jobs to pay less than comparable male-dominated jobs is stronger in high-ranking jobs. Taken together, the results are consistent with the exclusion of women from high-ranking jobs as well as gender segregation within local occupation-industry cells.

Occupational Segregation and the Gender Gap in Workplace Authority: National versus Local Labor Markets

Co-authored with Philip N. Cohen

Previous research linking occupational gender segregation to the workplace authority gap assumes that the effect of gender composition is invariant across occupations, ignoring the important distinction of whether an occupation’s relevant labor market is local or national. We offer a new method for defining occupational labor markets and hypothesize that the effect of occupation gender composition on the authority gap will be strongest in national labor market occupations. Both sexes’ odds of possessing work authority decline with the representation of women; this effect is strongest in the more desirable, national labor market occupations. Assuming occupations are part of one labor market results in understating the gender composition penalty for national labor market occupations.

Job Search Methods: Consequences for Gender-Based Earnings Inequality

co-authored with Lisa Torres

We extend research on both the job search and gender inequality by examining the effects of various types of job search methods on earnings. Specifically, data from a multistage, area-probability sample of adult residents in three large U.S. cities is used to test (1) whether the types of job search methods used (i.e., “formal” versus “informal”) account for any of the gender gap in earnings and (2) whether the earnings returns to different types of search methods vary by gender. The results indicate that, net of worker characteristics, job search methods account for little of the gender gap in earnings. Thus, the idea that formal search methods play a strong role in reducing this type of gender inequality is not well supported.

Occupational Segregation and the Devaluation of Women’s Work across U.S. Labor Markets

co-authored with Philip N. Cohen

Previous research on the devaluation of women’s work has investigated whether the net effect of gender composition varies across jobs and organizational settings. We extend that research by using hierarchical linear models that combine data from a random sample of U.S. work establishments with metropolitan-area data to explore whether macro-level gender inequality also influences the tendency to devalue women’s work roles. Thus, we offer the first attempt to examine processes that lead to organizational gender inequality in local labor market contexts. Specifically, we hypothesize that gender devaluation will be strongest in highly gender-segregated labor markets. One reason for this may be that in segregated markets, men are in a stronger position to benefit from devaluation while women are less able to resist it. The results strongly support this hypothesis: Higher levels of occupational segregation at the labor market level are associated with a significantly increased tendency to devalue women’s work roles. This finding is not explained by a diverse set of controls at both the establishment and local labor market level. Our findings highlight an additional way that gender segregation intensifies labor market inequality.