Male Earnings Research Articles

The Politics of Employment Discrimination in the Federal Bureaucracy

THE federal government is the largest employer in the United States. In 1978, it employed over 2.4 million full-time civilian workers, of whom 31.1 percent were women, and 22.0 percent were classified as minority employees.' The evidence in several recent studies suggests that the earnings of minorities and women employed by the federal government are substantially lower than the earnings of similar white males; they also conclude that the extent of wage discrimination in the federal government is slightly less than that found in the private sector.2 Although these studies provide a useful description of the economic status of the various sex and race groups, they do not expand our understanding of the government's behavior in its hiring and placement of these groups. That is, these studies give little hint as to how government objectives are translated into federal employment policy. This paper shifts the focus of analysis from a comparison of federal and private racial and sexual wage differentials to a study of how different

An inter-city analysis of the inequality in black and white male earnings, 1950–70

This paper examines variations in black and white median earnings among males for 79 metropolitan areas over the period 1950 to 1970. By examining aggregated data from smaller areas, the results of this study suggest the literature has overlooked important intra-unit variations at the metropolitan level. Racial earnings are shown to have become slightly more unequal in Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas over the twenty-year period of this study. The results of this study support the argument that younger blacks are better prepared and more able to secure relatively higher paying jobs in recent years than their predecessors. However, metropolitan industrial specialization, size and growth are found to be important factors working against equality in racial earnings.

The use of time series processes to model the error structure of earnings in a longitudinal data analysis

This study presents an error structure that offers a rich statistical framework for panel data analysis. It includes as special cases most of the error specifications found in longitudinal studies of wages and earnings. A general set of procedures for choosing a specification of this error structure and estimating its parameters appears in the first part of this study. The last section applies these procedures to fit an error structure for wages and earnings of prime-age males using data from the Michigan Panel of Income Dynamics.

Trends in Male Earnings Inequality

This study uses newly available time series data on the U.S. earnings distribution to analyze trends in male earnings inequality between 1958 and 1977. The major finding is that the observed slow upward trend in earnings inequality is well explained by a small number of plausible economic factors. The paper has four parts. Part II briefly reviews related time series research on both earnings and income inequality. Male earnings inequality is considered from the human capital perspective in section III, and from a less structured approach in section IV. The last section is a summary and conclusion.

OLDER ADULTS EARNING UNIVERSITY CREDITS: A DESCRIPTION

Of only 72 persons aged 62 and older who are enrolled for credit on campuses of the University of Wisconsin system, 48 responded to a questionnaire designed to assess demographic characteristics, attitudes toward lifelong education, and class format and group make‐up preferences. Respondents were more likely to be employed (60.4%), home owning (79.2%), and younger (M = 67.1, SD = 8.19; than both auditing and nonparticipant elders previously described (Hooper & March, 1978). Female credit earners reported preferring seminar format, while male credit earners preferred lecture format; these preferences are opposite to those expressed by auditing respondents in the earlier study. Only 16.3% of the credit earners had fewer than 12 years of education, and only 4.8% had no previous experience of the university through their own participation or that of members of their families. Implications of the findings for teachers of older students are discussed.

The Effect of Americanization on Earnings: Some Evidence for Women

In a recent contribution to this Journal, Barry Chiswick (1978) coInpared earnings experiences of foreign-born and native-born white adult males. He es imated that actual annual earnings of foreign-born males are 1 percent lower than native-born male earnings, but earnings differential reverses to 3 percent in favor of foreign born when other variables (schooling, labor market experielce, area of residence, weeks worked, and years since migration) are held constant. Other important findings included evidence that partial effect of education on earnings is relatively lower for foreignborn mnales, but their postinimigration experience-earnings profile is relatively steeper, meaning a sharper rise of earnings with time in United States for foreign-born than for native-born males. The purpose of this note is to present some estimates of relative earnings of foreign-born females, for comparison with more detailed results of Chiswick. Chiswick restricted his analysis to males because of the problem of estimating labor market experience for women in data under study (1978, p. 898, n. 2), which came from 1970 Cemsus of Population (U.S. Bureau of Census 1972). Indeed, weaknesses of potential work experience (measured by Chiswick and others as age schooling 5) as a proxy for actual labor market experience have been verified in recent studies of female wages and employment (Blinder 1976; Rosenzweig 1976; Rosevizweig and Morgani 1976; Jones and Long 1979). However, literature does suggest some techniques that allow one to approximate wage-

The Effect of Unions on Earnings Inequality in Local Labor Markets

Investigates the determinants of interurban differences in earnings inequality measured by gini coefficients of the annual earnings of male and female workers. Why trade union wage policies tend to increase earnings inequality; Effect of unionization on male earnings inequality; Relationship between fringe benefits and level of earnings. (Abstract copyright EBSCO.)

Language and the Earnings of Quebec Males in 1970 in specific Industries and Occupations

This paper examines the role of differences in language skills in explaining differences in the level of labour earnings of males residing in Quebec. Canada in 1970. The paper puts forward an analytical framework that could be of use for others interested in explaining earnings in bi-, tri- or multi-lingual labour markets and shows that a knowledge of English was more highly rewarded than a knowledge of French, ceteris paribus, in Quebec in 1970.The paper is divided in four parts. The first part outlines the theoretical framework and the empirical evidence that leads to the hypothesis that English is a more highly rewarded skill in the labour market of Quebec than French in 1970. The second part describes the database, discusses the choice of the functional form and presents the independent variables and their expected signs and, when appropriate, relative magnitudes. The third part examines the results for the whole of Quebec males in 1970 with particular attention paid to returns to language skills. The fourth part examines the results for specific industries and occupations.

Taxation, Human Capital, and Uncertainty

The growth of tax rates on earned income has focused attention upon the impact of such taxes on work effort. The effect of taxes on hours of work has been the subject of both careful theoretical and econometric study. The basic lesson of the theoretical literature is that the impact of taxation on hours of work is logically indeterminate because of the familiar conflict between income and substitution effects. Therefore, an enormous amount of econometric research has been done on this subject. Although there is a disconcertingly high variance in estimates of labour supply elasticities, it would probably be fair to say that the consensus is that the response in hours of work to changes in the net wage is very small for prime age male earners. This finding has been interpreted by some as evidence that taxes have little influence on work effort.

Occupational Sex Identification and the Assessment of Male and Female Earnings Inequality

Recent research on sex differences in the process of earnings attainment has relied heavily on occupational prestige or status as a determinant of male and female earnings. Utilizing occupational level data from the U.S. Census and the Dictionary of Occupational Titles, this paper presents evidence suggesting that the use of prestige may lead to misspecification ws hen the earnings attainment of males andfemales is compared. The data reveal differences in the nature of the occupational task by occupational sex identification within levels of prestige. Since some of these task differences are shown to be income relevant, the task-based earning potential of male dominated occupations is higher than the earning potential of equally prestigious occupations dominated by females. Finally, after the effects of both prestige and the nature of the task have been controlled, the sex identification of the occupation is showtsn to have a substantial impact on male and female earnings.

Comparative earnings of Greek Cypriot women and men

Utilizing government labor statistical reports, which are based upon a sample of approximately 17% of all Greek employees in the labor force in Cyprus, it was found that females receive substantially less pay than do males for the same type of work performed. Although the difference in pay between men and women is greater for the lower incomed wage earners, there are also marked differences in pay between men and women among the higher incomed salaried workers. In addition, the gap between female and male earnings has been widening rather than narrowing during recent years. The cultural factors which serve to perpetuate sex discrimination in earnings are identified and discussed.

Intergenerational Wealth Transfers and the Educational Decisions of Male Youth: An Alternative Interpretation

Donald 0. Parsons' recent article in this Journal raises several important questions.' Using a statistical model that has been employed by numerous sociologists for over ten years, Parsons illustrates the effects of various measures of family background on male youths' schooling and earnings.2 Parsons' original contribution to this literature is to employ a human-investment model in order to separate the total schooling effect of a given family characteristic into productivity, cost, and consumption components. For example, one of Parsons' most intriguing results is that a mother's educational attainment has its main influence on her son's labor market achievement through its effects on the structure of the child's tastes for schooling and through the productivity effect of schooling on earnings. Father's schooling, on the other hand, has its effect primarily through reducing the cost of schooling arising apparently from the greater subsidies more educated fathers bestow on their children.3 If this is true, exactly what is it that well-educated mothers do in the home that gives their children an earnings advantage in the labor market? Further, if this advantage reflects primarily environmental rather than genetic factors, can some type of social policy be used to replicate in families with low parental levels of education the process (whatever it is) of intergenerational wealth transmission enjoyed by high-status families? Parents can transmit income and wealth to their offspring in a variety of ways. At one extreme, transmittal occurs directly through bequests and gifts of financial assets. On the other hand, biological parents supply the genetic endowments that may affect skills useful in school and the labor market. Finally, parental time devoted to the rearing of children can also augment a child's skills and traits.4 It is these parental investments of time and goods in the children-particularly in the preschool years-which we wish to discuss here. If it could be shown, for example, that there is a consistent relationship between the well-known family background variables (e.g., parental education, occupational status, family size) used by Parsons, investments of parental time in preschool human capital, and the outcomes of the investment (the child's schooling and earnings), we could an-

A Simultaneous Model Approach to the Determinants of Male Earnings Differentials in Turkey for 1968

Income distribution is a topical issue in all countries regardless of their economic and social systems or levels of development. In recent years, relationship between income distribution and process of development has come under increasing scrutiny. Parallel to this development, increasing attention has been given by economists and statisticians to empirical analysis of distribution of income. The purpose of this paper is to examine causes of annual earnings differentials among male household heads outside agriculture in Turkey for 1968.1,2 The primary data source is a survey conducted by Department of Population Studies of Hacettepe University of Turkey in 1968.3 In most of studies that deal with causes of inequality, key explanatory variables have been education and experience (Becker and Chiswick, 1966; Mincer, 1974). Others have introduced geographic location, ability, occupation, and physical capital factors in addition to human capital factors (Fishlow, 1974; Griliches and Mason, 1972). As Richard D. Morgenstern notes, however, the notion that socio-economic background is important in determining an individual's income has been played down in literature concurrent with rise in popularity of human capital explanation of earnings differences.4 Only recently, socioeconomic background factors and intergenerational transfers of inequality have been gaining their deserved importance in income distribution literature.5 The second shortcoming of single equation models of income distribution has been their lack of attention to interactions between explanatory variables. Ribich and Murphy point out that while single equation models might suffice as a reasohable equation for predicting earnings, relative importance of independent variables would be obscured by statistical tests that focused on this equation alone.6 In this paper, distribution of earnings among male heads of households is examined within frameworks of recursive and simultaneous equation models. The models developed have three endogenous variables, namely, education, occupation and earnings. The exogenous variables include availability and quality of schooling, experience, geographical location and socio-economic background factors. The causal model of income determination employed in this study is given in figure 1.

Indirect and Induced Benefit-Cost Analysis: A Case Study

Carnoy, Martin, Class Analysis and Investment in Human Resources: Dynamic Model, Review of Radical Political Economics 3 (1971), 56-81. Corcoran, Mary, Christopher Jencks, and Michael Olneck, Effects of Family Background on Earnings, The American Review 66 (May 1976), 430-435. Duncan, Otis Dudley, A Socio-Economic Index for all Occupations, in Albert J. Reiss, Otis Dudley Duncan, P. K. Hatt, and C. C. North (eds.), Occupation and Social Status (New York: Free Press of Glencoe, 1961). Fishlow, Albert, and Human Capital: Some Further Results for Brazil, mimeograph, 1974. Griliches, Zvi, and William M. Mason, Education, Income and Ability, Journal of Political Economy 80 (May/June 1972), S74-S103. Kasnakoglu, Zehra, Distribution in Turkey: Study on the Determinants of Male Earnings Differentials in 1968, Ph.D. thesis, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1975. , A Study on the Determinants of Male Income Differentials in Turkey for 1968, Hacettepe Bulletin of Natural Sciences and Engineering 5 (June 1976), 90-122. Mincer, Jacob, Schooling, Experience and Earnings (New York: Columbia University Press, 1974). Morgenstern, Richard D., Direct and Indirect Effects on Earnings of Schooling and Socio-economic Background, this REVIEW 55 (May 1973), 225-233. Ribich, Thomas L., and James L. Murphy, Economic Returns to Increased Educational Spending, Journal of Human Resources 10 (Winter 1975), 56-77.

Completed Fertility and its Timing: An Economic Analysis of U.S. Experience Since World War II.

Presents an economic model of fertility behavior designed to explain and predict both current fertility rates and expected family size emphasizing the distinction between male and female earnings in affecting fertility. It is hypothesized that an increase in husbands earnings raises family income and leads to an increased demand for children. An increase in the wifes income however raises the cost of children due to the rise in the opportunity cost of childbearing and rearing. The role of both current and future income and costs is emphasized particularly the role of substitution of births between time periods. A temporary increase in the wifes wage provides an incentive to postpone births while if the wifes wages were expected to increase in some future period current births would be less costly relative to future births. The option to substitute births between time periods perhaps leaving completed fertility unaffected means that the simple relationships between current fertility and current economic variables may be an inappropriate guide to the relationship between economic variables and ultimate family size. The effects of economic variables on the timing of births are distinguished from the effects on the level of completed fertility by estimating an auxiliary model that predicts future male and female income based on age and year specific data from 1957 to 1975. A fertility rate model showing the effect of both current and future economic variables on current fertility is subsequently estimated and the effects of female and male income changes on both current and completed fertility are simulated. Male income has a positive effect and female income a negative effect on both current and completed fertility. More than 1/2 of the observed effect is due to indirect influence of these economic variables on expectations concerning future income. The strong tendency to substitute births between time periods in response to female wage rates suggests that most of the year-to-year change in period fertility rates is due to altered timing of births. The regression model allows forecasting of the life cycle of couples fertility at different starting dates with the level of expected completed fertility computed as the couple ages. Cohorts have substantially revised their target fertility in response to changes in economic variables. Total fertility rate is decomposed into timing and completed fertility using these estimates. The paths of these components over time show that the 1950s baby boom resulted from gradually increasing expected family size and from a compression of births into those years. The subsequent decline in fertility was primarily the result of downward revisions of completed fertility expectations not due to deferred births. These results indicate that the current low level of fertility should continue apart from temporary increases when the time cost of children falls. (Authors modified)

The Effect of Earnings Discrimination Against Women on the Economic Position of Men

This paper uses the results of the 1970 census to examine the question whether males, especially lower-income males, benefit economically from earnings discrimination against women. The kinds of arguments raised in the literature on the parallel question, whether whites benefit from economic discrimination against blacks are examined for their bearing on the effect of sexual discrimination,. The ratio of urban female to urban male and the ratio of white female to white male earnings are used as indicators of earnings discrimination against women, while median annual male earnings and the Gini index of male earnings inequality are used as the measure of male gain. The fifty U.S. states are compared on these measures through correlation analysis. The percentage of the population in manufacturing, personal income per capita, the percent living in cities, the percentage of the population that is Third World and the region of the country are controlled through partial correlation. Indicators of earnings discrimination against women are also correlated with a measure of the strength of unions. The results show that discrimination agalinst women does not affect the median annual earnings of males, but that the greater the discrimination

Response Error in Earnings Functions for Nonblack Males

Biases due to measurement errors in an earnings function for nonblack males are assessed by estimating unobserved variable models with data from the Income Supplement Reinterview program of the March 1973 Current Population Survey and from the remeasurement program of the 1973 Occupational Changes in a Generation-II survey. We find that reports of social origins, educational and occupational attainments, labor supply, and earnings of nonblack males are subject to primarily random response errors. Logarithmic earnings is one of the most accurately measured indicators of socioeconomic success. Further, retrospective reports of status variables are as reliable as contemporaneous reports. When measurement errors are ignored for nonblacks, the total economic return to schooling is underestimated by about 16% and the effects of some background variables are underestimated by as much as 15%. The total effects offirst and current job status are underestimated by about 20% when measurement errors are ignored, as are the unmediated effects of current job status. Conflicting evidence is presented on whether respondents tend to understate the consistency between their earnings and educational attainments in the Current Population Survey. If there is such a tendency, unmediated effects of education are modestly understated when response errors are ignored, and they are overstated if no such tendency exists.

Racial Discrimination and White Gain

The question of whether or not whites gain economically from economic discrimination against third world people is examined with evidence from the 1970 U.S. census. The impact of racial discrimination is measured by the percentage of the population of third world origin in each state and by the ratio of black to white male earnings for those who work full time. White gain is measured by the level of white male earnings in each state and the Gini coefficient of earnings inequality among white males. If whites gain economically from racism, we would expect to find that the greater the percentage of the population of a state that is third world and the lower the ratio of black/white earnings then the higher the level of white earnings and the less the inequality in white earnings. The basic relationships were examined controlling for percentage of the population that is urban, percentage of the economically active population in manufacturing, level of personal income, region and percentage of the population that is third world. It is found that whites do not gain from economic discrimination; on the contrary, white working people actually lose economically from such discrimination. It is argued that racism is a divisive force which undermines the economic and political strength of working people and acts to worsen the economic position of white workers in the most racist areas. In support of this interpretation, data on the strength of unions is examined.

Sexual Inequalities and Socioeconomic Achievement in the U.S., 1962-1973

Intercohort shifts in mean education, occupational status and earnings for married persons in the experienced civilian labor forces of 1962 and 1973 represent socioeconomic improvements for both men and women. While the occupational and educational achievements of women have kept pace with men's and indeed exceed the male means, the ratio of female to male earnings has declined from 0.39 to 0.38 for persons in the ECLF. Causal models of the processes of socioeconomic achievement show men and women to be allocated to levels of education and occupational status in much the same manner. Women's achievements are somewhat less related to their family origins, especially farm origins, than are men's, and the net effect of educational attainment on occupational status is larger for women. Intercohort changes in the process of occupational achievement have affected both sexes and include an increase in the net occupational status benefit of an additional year of schooling and a decline in the occupational handicap of farm origins. Equality of economic opportunity for women has not followed from women's opportunities for schooling and occupational status. While the net returns to education have improved more noticeably for women than men, the inter-temporal increases in returns to occupational status have benefited only men. Sexual discrimination accounts for 85% of the earnings gap in 1962 and 84% in 1973.

Interregional Migration, Education, and Poverty in the Urban Ghetto: Another Look at Black-White Earnings Differentials

T HE inferiority of southern black schools (especially rural schools) alleged by the Coleman Report (1966), coupled with the mass migration historically of southern blacks to northern cities, provides one potential explanation of the generally low returns to black education and of urban poverty in the nonSouth. Evidence from the 1960 Census suggests, however, that black migrants to the metropolitan North had higher incomes and less unemployment than blacks born there, even after controlling for differences in age, years of school completed, and a number of other variables (Masters, 1972). More recent evidence, confirming this pattern, from the 1967 Survey of Economic Opportunity (Weiss and Williamson, 1972) and the 1970 Census (Long and Heltman, 1974) also discounts the inferiority of southern black schools as an explanation of urban poverty in the non-South. In fact, the overall effect of a northern or even a large southern ghetto environment may be more harmful to black economic progress than a rural southern origin (Weiss and Williamson, 1972). In this paper we present results, using data from the National Longitudinal Surveys, that support the economic disadvantage of a nonsouthern ghetto environment for young black males. Controlling for differences in age, years of school completed, region and character of current residence, we find the mean earnings of young black males educated in the metropolitan non-South are substantially less than those of their peers educated in the rural South. We are unable to confirm this disadvantage for older black males, however. Several attitudinal and labor force characteristics of young blacks were examined to account for this pattern. The results suggest that a major problem in reducing black poverty lies in improving the environment of the nonsouthern ghetto. We also extend the analysis to whites in order to examine the rural-urban dimensions of environment and migration and their effect upon racial earnings differentials. The National Longitudinal Surveys, which provide the primary data for this paper, constitute a five-year longitudinal study of the labor market experiences of four subsets of the U.S. population: men 45 to 59 years of age, women 30 to 44 years of age, young men 14 to 24 years, and young women 14 to 24 years of age.1 For each of these cohorts a national probability sample of the noninstitutionalized civilian population was drawn by the Bureau of the Census. The present study is based upon data collected in the first round of interviews in 1966 with the two cohorts of men. Analysis is restricted to men whose current or last job reported in the survey week of 1966 was as a wage or salary earner. The self-employed are excluded to overcome the difficulty of separating income received as returns to physical capital from that received as returns to human capital. An additional universe restriction is included for the younger men's cohort to ensure they had been out of school for a minimum of 12 months. In section I we build upon earlier earningsfunctions studies by introducing variables which identify geographic origin of schooling. Section II explores the implications of our findReceived for publication January 28, 1974. Revision accepted for publication July 9, 1975. *This paper was prepared under a contract with the Manpower Administration, U.S. Department of Labor. We are indebted to Bennett Harrison, Ray Marshall, Herbert S. Parnes, and a helpful referee for comments on an earlier version of this manuscript. We especially thank Clarice Conger-Thompson, Gary Schoch, and Keith Stober for research and computational assistance. As is customary, the views expressed in this article are our own. I For a description of these surveys see Parnes (1972).