Gender Differences in Job-Related Networks

Abstract

Despite the conventional wisdom that employed women suffer by dint of their exclusion from “old boy” networks, there has been little investigation of gender differences in networks and their implications for occupational outcomes. This article represents a first step toward incorporating network concepts into analysis of gender-based occupational inequalities. In it, I document differences between the job-related networks of women and men in a sample of recent job changers in four white-collar occupations. Women know persons in fewer occupations than men; their networks are negatively affected by having children younger than 6, and by changing jobs in response to their spouses' mobility;men's networks are unaffected by these constraints.