Estimating Gender Differences in Access to Jobs

Abstract

This paper proposes a new measure of gender differences in access to jobs based on a job assignment model. This measure is the probability ratio of getting a job for females and males at each rank of the wage ladder. We derive a non-parametric estimator of this access measure and estimate it for French full-time executives aged 40-45 in the private sector. Our results show that the gender difference in the probability of getting a job increases along the wage ladder from 9% to 50%. Females thus have a significantly lower access to high-paid jobs than to low-paid jobs.

Keywords: gender, discrimination, wages, quantiles, job assignment model, glass ceiling

JEL Classification: J16, J31, J71