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Gender Differences

Paper Session

Saturday, Jan. 5, 2019 10:15 AM - 12:15 PM

Atlanta Marriott Marquis, A705
Hosted By: American Economic Association
  • Chair: Luca Flabbi, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

All on Board? New Evidence on Board Gender Diversity from a Comprehensive Panel of Firms

Joanna Tyrowicz
,
FAME|GRAPE, IAAEU, IZA, University of Warsaw
Siri Tejersen
,
American University
Jakub Mazurek
,
FAME|GRAPE

Abstract

There are more men by the name of John among executive managers in firms listed on NYSE than all women taken together. Low presence of women on management and supervisory boards has long been a debated issue, with some countries implementing dedicated policies to raise participation of women in top management. Literature has so far identified two stylized facts: women are unicorns among top managers and supervisory board members; and there is no evidence that female management is associated with weaker firm performance. However, most of the studies base on small and non-representative samples.

We provide an overview of gender board diversity in Europe, using an exceptional database of nearly 20 million firms from 44 countries and over two decades. We develop a novel approach to gender attribution, based on linguistic heuristics and names of individual board members. Hence, we encompass data from 1990s onwards. We document substantial country and industry heterogeneity and slowly improving time trends.

We show that women on supervisory boards actually reduce the likelihood that a woman is on a management board. In fact, as much as 90% of European corporations have no women on supervisory boards, whereas only roughly 80% of them have no women on management boards. We also show that more gender equality at a country level is not conducive to greater gender board diversity and provide several institutional economics explanations for that pattern.

Drivers of Participation Elasticities Across Europe: Gender or Earner Role within the Household?

Cortnie Shupe
,
Free University of Berlin and DIW Berlin
Charlotte Bartels
,
DIW Berlin

Abstract

The extent to which work incentives inherent in the various tax-benefit systems across the European Union (EU) drive observed employment differences remains a topic of contention throughout many member states. At the extensive margin, the participation tax rate (PTR) measures tax-benefit distortions to work. Using harmonized EUROMOD data and the accompanying tax-benefit calculator for the EU, we compute PTRs across 12 EU countries and find that work disincentives largely depend on household composition and the individual's earner role within the household. We provide an in-depth analysis of the PTR and its main drivers including taxes, social insurance contributions and benefits. We then estimate participation elasticities using an IV Group estimator that enables us to investigate the responsiveness of individuals to work incentives. We contribute to the literature on heterogeneous elasticities by providing estimates for different socioeconomic groups by country, gender and earner role within the household. Our results show an average elasticity of 0.08 for men and of 0.14 for women as well as a high degree of heterogeneity across countries. The commonly cited difference in elasticities between men and women stems predominantly from the earner role of the individual within the household and nearly disappears once we control for this factor.

Coauthorship and the Gender Gap in Top Economics Journal Publications

Pallab Ghosh
,
University of Oklahoma
Zexuan Liu
,
International Academy of Business and Economics

Abstract

Coauthorship has become the new norm in academics since the early 1970s because it enhances productivity. However, the gender gap in economics journal publication continues to persist, which explains why there are fewer women in the economics profession. This study investigates the role of coauthorship in the gender gap in top economics journals for untenured faculty members in the US. We construct a unique dataset from the CVs of academic economists from the top 96 PhD-granting economics departments in the US. Our results suggest that, compared to men, women are matched with less productive unique coauthors because women begin their academic careers in lower-ranked economics departments than men, which is associated with institutional gender bias. This poor-quality matching can explain approximately one-third of the gender gap in the top 20 economics journals during the period in which these women are untenured.

Is She Free to Work? Impact of Rural Health Insurance on Labour Supply in India

Uttara Balakrishnan
,
University of Maryland-College Park
Uttara Balakrishnan
,
University of Maryland-College Park

Abstract

Health shocks impose a substantial burden on households and communities. In the absence of adequate health insurance households are pushed into poverty which impacts their labour supply and productivity. In this study, I examine whether provision of free rural health insurance in India increases labour supply by enabling households to cope with health shocks. To isolate causal effects, I use the district wise phased-in implementation of the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) - a rural health insurance program in India - and apply a difference-in-difference design to estimate intent-to-treat (ITT) impacts on labour supply using the National Sample Survey data from India (NSS). I find that in treated districts, both men and women are increasingly likely to spend more days per week on the private casual labour market after the introduction of the RSBY. However, the increase in labour supply for women is much larger. Further, women in households with fewer working age members and a higher number of dependents see the largest impacts. Men, on the other hand are more likely to reduce time spent in self-employment activities. Additionally, both men and women are less likely to miss work due to major morbidities and hospitalization utilization rates increase. This suggests that the program acts through three main channels: a reduction in time spent at home for women in caregiving tasks, reduction in time spent for men in self-employment activities and finally, a decrease in time spent being unable to work due to a major morbidity for both men and women. The average treatment effect on the treated (ATT), estimated for RSBY beneficiary households using the Indian Human Development Survey (IHDS) a nationally representative longitudinal dataset, reveals the same story.
JEL Classifications
  • J1 - Demographic Economics