Experience‐earnings profiles, education and gender

Abstract

Investigates the shape of experience‐earnings profiles across gender. Given that self‐employment offers both an alternative to unemployment and potentially flexible – and thereby attractive to female labour market participants – working arrangements, estimates separate profiles for employees and self‐employees. The male results support Lazear and Moore’s agency‐driven explanation for the shape of experience‐earnings profiles with self‐employment being characterized by a relatively flat profile. The estimated female employee profile is flatter than its male counterpart, a finding which lends support to the human capital explanation for gender‐specific earnings profiles, whereby females tend to withdraw from the labour market and so reduce their incentive to invest in human capital. In the case of female self‐employees, educational attainment rather than labour market experience appears to be the significant determinant of earnings.

Citation

Brown, S. and Sessions, J.G. (2001), "Experience‐earnings profiles, education and gender", Journal of Economic Studies, Vol. 28 No. 6, pp. 408-422. https://doi.org/10.1108/EUM0000000006276