The present paper explores the two components of the glass ceiling effect: promotion barriers for women to the executive sphere and a gender-based differential in executive pay. The research setting is the British oil industry, which constitutes a male-dominated sector. Analyzing both components separately, the results suggest that females are promoted more frequently to the executive ranks while they experience a pay bias compared to men. Thus, the analysis reveals that the glass ceiling is cracking in this gender-imbalanced industry. Yet, pay discrimination still exists. However, within the narrow corridor of executives, the present study suggests that gender pay discrimination diminishes the higher one who climbs up the executive ladder. The latter finding raises the cynical question: How far up the hierarchy ladder does a woman need to climb to overcome gender-based pay discrimination?decomposition, executive labor market, gender bias in promotion, gender pay gap, glass ceiling, male-dominated industry, pay discrimination

Getting more women into male-dominated industries has become the nucleus of public debate in many industrialized countries. However, it is still not clear how growing female representation impacts the individual performance of workers in these sectors. The research setting of this study is the Norwegian oil industry as a typically male-dominated sector. Using a fixed-effects regression model, the present paper investigates two different constellations: 1) how growing female representation impacts the individual performance of workers at the same hierarchical level (within-ranks); 2) how growing female representation at the next highest rank impacts the performance of subordinated workers (downward-flowing). Consistent with prevailing theory, the within-ranks analysis reveals that the performance of men in relation to a higher share of female peers follows a cubic pattern. This shows that men’s performance is the highest in gender-balanced teams. For women, this relationship cannot be confirmed. In terms of downward-flowing effects, female supervisors in this particular industry are estimated to have a negative effect on the performance of both, men and women. This result on negative downward-flowing effects requires a deeper analysis on the corporate cultural background.

Purpose This study aims to identify and explain a possible gender pay gap in the creative industry. By using the salary information of Hollywood actors, this paper restricts the analysis to a relatively homogenous group of workers. In addition, actors' human capital endowments and past performance can be measured precisely. The factors that impact the salaries of movie stars are likely to influence the pay of other high-wage employees, such as athletes and executives. Design/methodology/approach This paper uses a rich panel data set including 178 female and male actors in 973 movies released between 1980 and 2019. Using a random-effects model and the Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition approach, this paper distinguishes between a fraction of the gender pay gap that can be explained and another fraction that cannot be explained. Hence, only the unexplained residual typically obtained by estimating two standard Mincer-type earnings functions is due to discriminatory pay practices. Findings This study reveals a pay difference between female and male actors. Gender-specific representation in leading roles and systematic differences in performance measures can explain this pay difference. While female actors' underrepresentation in leading roles reflects consumer tastes and, therefore, reflects discriminatory attitudes, no evidence can be found for direct pay discrimination in Hollywood's movie business. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first Hollywood study to relying on a rich panel data set that includes various measures of the human capital characteristics of the different individual actors. This paper's theoretical contribution lies in applying classic labor economics reasoning to explain pay determination in Hollywood's movie business.