The gender wage gap and wage arrears in Russia: Evidence from the RLMS

Abstract

Using the RLMS, this paper re-examines the nature of the gender wage gap in Russia between 1994 and 1998 taking into account the pervasiveness of Russia's non-payment institutions. Investigating discrimination 'bands' at different sections of the income distribution and for various important sub-groups we found the following. Using censored regressions that capture the effect of wage arrears and payment inkind, the wage gap is larger than estimates derived using OLS. The wage gap is distributed unevenly both across the income distribution and between various sub-groups. Specifically, women at the lower end of the income distribution suffer the highest degree of discrimination. However, we find that wage arrears and payment in-kind attenuated wage discrimination, in particular amongst the lowest paid workers. The evidence seems to suggest that Russian enterprise managers assigned importance to equity considerations when allocating wage arrears and payment in-kind.

Explaining the Gender Wage Gap in Georgia

“…This result is important as it indicates the presence of different mechanisms describing the selection into wage work for men and women. A number of studies conducted on transition countries find no evidence of sample selection bias (Gerry et al 2004), while others conduct sample selection bias correction only for women, implicitly assuming that sample selection bias is an issue only for the female population (Arabsheibani and Lau 1999;Arabsheibani and Mussurov 2007). The results in this study point to a need to pay more attention to the causes of sample selection bias among men as well as women.…”

“…Given the counterintuitive nature of this result, the vast majority of studies either does not address this issue or attribute it to a misspecification of the model. In fact, for former Soviet republics, all studies, which use the Heckman correction in the context of gender wage gap, obtain negative estimates of ρ, with none attempting to elaborate on its implications (e.g., Arabsheibani and Lau 1999;Cheidvasser and Benitez Silva 2007;Gerry et al 2004). …”

“…A number of studies analyze the Russian case. Among them are Brainerd (1998), Newell and Reilly (1996), Reilly (1999), Arabsheibani and Lau (1999), Glinskaya and Mroz (2000), Gerry et al (2004), Cheidvasser andBenitez Silva (2007), Kazakova (2007), and Johnes and Tanaka (2008). According to these studies, in Russia the female/male wage ratio varies from 0.60 (reported for 1994 in Brainerd [1998]) to 0.78 (reported for 1995 in Glinskaya and Mroz [2000]).…”

Economic Crisis and Political Participation in a Transitional Economy: Evidence from Russia

“…Following the crisis, the gender pay gap widened, with the substantial part of the wage gap explained by discrimination. Gerry, Kim and Li (2004) show that 18-34 year old women experienced the largest discrimination following the 1998 crisis. Welfare indicators from the RLMS show that the poverty rate increased from 22 percent in 1996 to 33 percent in 1998 (Lokshin and Ravallion, 2000).…”

Gender Pay Gaps in the Former Soviet Union: A Review of the Evidence

“…(Brainerd 1998). As many as 13 observations are reported in terms of contractual rather than actual wages, which can introduce bias if wage arrears are present (Gerry, Kim, and Li 2004;Ogloblin 2005).…”