How Has the Gender Earnings Gap in Ireland Changed in Thirty Years

Bibliographic Data

ID5934280
AuthorsMichèlle Barrett (0000-0001-5191-9445, Economic and Social Research Institute), Karina Doorley (0000-0002-6535-0648, Economic and Social Research Institute), Pearse Redmond (0000-0001-8272-8596, Economic and Social Research Institute, corresponding author), Paul Redmond, Barra Roantree (0000-0002-8738-8225, Economic and Social Research Institute)
Year2022
Volume11
Issue8
Pages367
Publication date2022-08-17
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Sciences (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2076-0760 • E-ISSN: 2076-0760
PublisherMDPI AG (PUBLISHER • IT)
DOI10.3390/socsci11080367
OpenAlexW4292409716
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited25

Since 1987, the wages of women in Ireland have been growing faster than those of men. This, coupled with a decrease in the average hours worked by men, has resulted in a reduction in the gender earnings gap in Ireland, most notably at the bottom of the earnings distribution. This paper provides a descriptive analysis of the growth of male and female wages, weekly earnings, and differences in working patterns across the wage and earnings distribution in Ireland over the last three decades, using detailed microdata covering the period 1987-2019. Using a Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition approach, based on unconditional quantile regressions for each time period, we also show how the explained and unexplained components of the gender wage gap have changed across the wage distribution. We find that the mean and median gender gap in earnings fell by one-sixth and one-quarter, respectively, between 1987 and 2019. This change is attributable to the faster growth of women's wages compared to men's and some convergence in the average hours worked by men and women. However, there has been relatively stable structural inequality at the top of the wage and earnings distribution over the past three decades, which points towards a persistent glass ceiling in Ireland

Demographic economics · Distribution (mathematics · Earnings · Econometrics · Economics · Gender gap · Geography · Glass ceiling · Inequality · Labour economics · Microdata (statistics · Population · Quantile · Quantile regression · Quarter (Canadian coin · Wage · Demography · Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics · Labor market dynamics and wage inequality · Retirement, Disability, and Employment

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