The Race between Technological Progress and Female Advancement: Changes in Gender and Skill Premia in OECD Countries
Year: 2020
Type: preprint
Abstract: In recent decades, the male-female wage gap has fallen, while the skilled-unskilled wage gap has risen in advanced countries. The rate of decline in the gender wage gap has tended to be greater for unskilled than skilled workers, while the rate of increase in the skill wage gap has tended to be greater for male than female workers. To account for these trends, we develop an aggregate production function extended to allow for gender-specific capital-skill complementarity, and estimate it using shift-hare instruments and cross-country panel data from OECD countries. We confirm that information and communication technology (ICT) equipment is not only more complementary to skilled than unskilled workers but also more complementary to female than male workers. Our results show that changes in gender and skill premia are the outcome of the race between progress in ICT and advances in female educational attainment and employment.
Source: arXiv (Cornell University)
Authors: Hiroya Taniguchi, Ken Yamada
Institution: Kyoto University
Language: English
Subfield: Economics and Econometrics
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3029030709