Why Do Women's Fields of Study Pay Less? A Test of Devaluation, Human Capital, and Gender Role Theory

Abstract

As men are overrepresented in lucrative fields and women disproportionately graduate from disciplines that yield low wages in the labor market, horizontal sex segregation in higher education contributes significantly to economic gender inequality. But what underlies the association between sex composition and wages in fields of study? We draw on data from the German HIS Graduate Panel Study 1997 (N=4092) and use hierarchical linear models to adjudicate between devaluation theory and explanations based on differential sorting processes: human capital and gender role theory. The resulting evidence for both human capital and devaluation theory is scant. Consistent with gender role theory, differences in the attractiveness of fields to students with a careerist approach to higher education and the labor market in turn explain most of the association between field of studies’ sex composition and wage levels. We therefore conclude that gendered patterns of self-selection which derive from men’s socialization into the breadwinner role rather than valuative discrimination or rational anticipation of career interruptions underlie the association between fields’ sex composition and wage levels.

The Gender Income Gap and the Roles of Education and Family Formation: A Scientific Replication of Bobbitt-Zeher (2007)

“…These issues have been discussed elsewhere (Petersen 1989, Morgan 2005, Gerber and Cheung 2008, Ochsenfeld 2014.…”

Why do occupations dominated by women pay less? How ‘female-typical’ work tasks and working-time arrangements affect the gender wage gap among higher education graduates

“…Braakmann, 2013;Leuze and Strauß, 2009;Ochsenfeld, 2014) and by occupations (e.g. Grönlund and Magnusson, 2013;Leuze and Strauß, 2014;Triventi, 2013) are identified as important explanations for both Germany and other European countries.…”

“…The first strand uses the sorting processes of men and women into different subject types as explanatory points of reference (e.g. Braakmann, 2013;Ochsenfeld, 2014), while the second strand focuses on occupations and mechanisms taking place within the labour market (e.g. Grönlund and Magnusson, 2013;Triventi, 2013).…”

Preferences, constraints, and the process of sex segregation in college majors: A choice analysis

“…During the 1970s and '80s women came to embrace careers as part of their identity and increasingly entered 'investment related' majors such as business administration rather than focusing merely on 'consumption related' fields such as literature or home economics (Wilson and Boldizar, 1990;Goldin, 2006), but because this convergence was never completed, traditional gender attitudes persist into the present (Cotter et al, 2011). Since college majors strongly vary in the degree to which they promise high incomes to students (van de Werfhorst and Kraaykamp, 2001;Glocker and Storck, 2014;Ochsenfeld, 2014), gender differences in work-lifestyle preferences could contribute to horizontal sex segregation. In line with this argument Montmarquette et al (2002) show that women respond significantly less to changes in college majors' earnings potential than men do.…”