Proessay :: Term paper / research paper writing service - EFFECTS OF MINIMUM WAGES ON THE GENDER PAY GAP

This article explores the implications of alternative policy regimes for gender wage inequality. Against the background of a description of recent changes in pay ratios of men and women in Britain, the focus is primarily on calculating the likely effects on gender wage ratios of introducing the statutory minimum wage in the UK. The effects of alternative options are also assessed in part; giving women men's average hourly earnings, leaving occupations unchanged, and redistributing women through occupations in the same proportions as men, leaving their occupational average pay unchanged. The largest effects on pay ratios come from giving women the same pay as men in their existing occupations. However, a statutory minimum wage of [pound]3.60 per hour does improve the gender pay ratio and helps women at the lower end of the pay spectrum. It is also considerably easier to implement than other options.

Introduction

This article explores the implications of alternative policy regimes for gender wage inequality. The aim is to help to identify those regimes that have the potential to generate wage equality between men and women. The article focuses en passant on the UK and on the likely effects of the introduction of a national statutory minimum wage in 1999. Clearly the Low Pay Commission was aware of the disproportionate number of female employees who were low paid in comparison with male employees (Low Pay Commission, 1998). However, gender equality was not one of its objectives. Our investigation is intended to add this consideration to the Low Pay Commission's discussion about the effects of the minimum wage.

We consider first some of the background on the current levels of wage inequality in the UK and how this has changed over time. The effects of introducing legislation on gender equality have been studied extensively in the UK, and an understanding of past experience is a useful guide as to which policies will be most effective in bringing about gender equality in wage rates.

Roughly speaking, three quarters of British women of working age have paid jobs at the turn of the Millennium, compared with around four-tenths in 1950. Over the twenty years since 1975, the economic activity rate of British women aged 16-59 has increased, from 62 per cent to 73 per cent in 1995. Most of the increase has occurred since 1985, largely consisting of an increase in the number of women with paid jobs (67 per cent in 1995, though the number of unemployed women also increased, from 2 per cent to 5 per cent of the whole age group). There was very little growth in the percentage of women employed full-time between 1951 and 1985. The main growth was in part-time employment. Since then there has been a small increase in full-time employment (General Household Survey data in Dex and Joshi, 1997).

The following section reviews the evolution of the male-female wage gap in Britain, The third section examines the likely effects on gender wage ratios of the statutory minimum wage. Policies like minimum wages are sometimes contrasted with attempts to effect gender equality in wage rates through the law. Debates ensue about which of the various approaches is likely to have the most effect on improving the ratios. The fourth section attempts, therefore, to quantify the effects on gender wage ratios of alternative direct approaches. Our conclusions are described in the final section.

The evolution of the male female pay gap

The wages of British women over the past twenty years have shown some convergence and some divergence: convergence with men's wages, and divergence as the gap between the best and worst paid women has widened.

There has been a trend towards a smaller gender pay gap. The relative hourly mean wage of women in fulltime manual jobs rose from 47 per cent of men's in 1938 to 72 per cent in 1996 (Chart 1). It had been around 60 per cent from the mid-1940s to the mid-1970s, when the introduction of the Equal Pay Act was accompanied by a sudden upswing, starting in 1973 and peaking at 74 per cent in 1978. The series fell back to a plateau at around 70 per cent, until a gentle recovery since the late 1980s. Non-manual workers outnumber manual in the workforce, particularly for women. Unfortunately, wages are not recorded so far back in time for nonmanual workers. However, it is the case that the female to male wage ratio for non-manual workers also peaked around 1975, although at ratios below the manual series. A more sustained positive trend appears thereafter.

In contrast to the converging wage rates among male and female full-timers, the pay of female part-timers relative to men has remained steady. The gap between women employed full-time and part-time actually grew wider (Chart 2). Moreover the relative gap in full-time weekly earnings remains bigger than that in hourly earnings because of the higher average hours worked by men.

Changes in the distribution of wages

Disparities within the distributions are shown in Chart 3 expressed as the ratio of the top decile to the bottom decile. The rise in these from the end of the 1970s illustrates the well-known rise in earnings inequality which occurred over this period, plausibly linked to the deregulation of the labour market. Disparities in the wages of men full-timers grew most, closely followed by the wages of women full-timers. Disparities between women part-timers remained narrower, but also grew. The differences between men and the two sorts of women converged less at the top of the distribution. It was more a case of the wages of the worst paid men falling to meet the wages of the worst paid women, than of the latter benefiting from particularly positive growth.

Explanations of changes in the structure and institutions of the labour market Composition and relativities

To some extent the upward shift of the gender wage ratio for manual and non-manual workers combined was the result of the relative decline of manual employment. However, relative wages within non-manual jobs were also shifting in favour of women, or rather towards reducing their disadvantages. Zabalza and Tzannatos (1986), studying the 1970s, found changes of ratios within

occupation, industry or agreement for two or three years around 1975, but no substantial contribution of occupational composition to the overall change. For the longer and later period starting in 1975, changes in within-category differentials become less important, and compositional change plays a greater part. Elias and Gregory (1994) follow 22 grouped occupations from the 1975 to 1990 New Earnings Survey data. The gender wage ratios show remarkable stability within most occupations.

The 'impact' of the Equal Pay Act?

The abrupt rise in the time series of women's relative wages shown in Charts 1 and 2 coincided with the full implementation of the Equal Pay Act. Was this actually an effect of the legislation, or just a coincidence? Did the introduction of the law really take immediate and sustained effect? It might seem unlikely, given its limitations and the pre-existing sex segregation of much employment. Sex segregation affected the impact of the Act because it restricted the numbers of cases covered by the legislation, which required men and women to be doing the same jobs in the same organisation. However, most analysts agree that the Act did have an effect. This does not mean the Act was the only factor. It is generally accepted that anti-inflationary incomes policies operating in 1974-6 would also have helped raise women's relative pay. The effectiveness of the Equal Pay Act is also attributed to the structure of centralised collective bargaining, by which a large proportion of the labour force was still covered. Acc ording to Zabalza and Tzannatos (1986), the Equal Pay Act started to take effect in 1973-4 as the sector covered by wage agreements set national wage rates to comply with the legislation. The non-covered sector followed suit, at the last minute, in 1975. Gender differentials remained wider in the non-covered sector than in the covered. It is remarkable that the subsequent dismantling of the collective wage setting machinery has not reversed the trend towards more equal pay. The weakening of labour organisations may help explain why the 1984 Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value Amendment has not had much effect on the trend level of relative wages. In any case the Amendment's requirement that individual comparators be identified made the legislation much less amenable to collective implementation. But it is also possible that the strengthening of the Equal Pay Act in 1984 helped preserve the upward trend.

The force of the Equal Pay Act even made itself felt in the rate of pay for part-time work in 1975, but as deregulation advanced, and particularly relied on nonstandard employment of part-timers, their wages failed to keep up with those of female full-timers. The rising pay of female full-timers, relative to males, over the 1980s and 1990s may just reflect compositional change. However, it may have been boosted by the strengthening of Equal Pay legislation. Also it may have been affected by other changes in the institutions of the labour market at the time -- the weakening of trades unions, privatisation and unemployment-- all of which have added to the downward pressure on wages which might affect men more than women.

Explanations in terms of the characteristics of workers

Changing characteristics of workers may produce 'compositional' explanations for changes in relative wages, but to the extent that workers of given characteristics are differentially remunerated, the institutions of the labour market are implicated. The evidence on education (Chart 4) implies a changing human capital composition of the labour force that would lead us to expect some convergence in the rates that men and women are paid (Dex and Joshi, 1997). Decomposition analyses on the characteristics versus rates of remuneration per characteristic all imply that, despite the Equal Pay Act, a considerable degree of pay discrimination remains (Chart 5).

Part-time employment, which receives lower rates of remuneration than full-time employment for given worker characteristics, remains responsible for a large proportion of the share of women who are low paid. It is therefore important to know whether it should be thought of as 'discrimination' in the same way as unequal remuneration of men and women usually is. Analysis of the 33 year old 1958 birth cohort study members in 1991 found that the low pay of part-timers was not just linked to their relatively low human capital, but to structural features of the labour market: firm size, industrial sector, private sector, lack of unions, occupational segregation and travel-to-work constraints, which lead to a lack of bargaining power in the face of labour monopsony (Joshi and Paci, 1998).

Extent of low pay amongst men and women

The extent of low pay in the UK depends heavily on the definition adopted. Researchers have not been consistent. Dex et al. (1994), used an hourly definition of two-thirds of the male median, to estimate that 38 per cent of full-time and 59 per cent of part-time employed women were low paid in the early 1990s. Less than one quarter of men were low paid using this hourly definition. Weekly definitions of low pay identify considerably higher percentages of employed women as low paid. Figures on the changes in low pay, relying on a weekly definition, show that its extent increased among full-time female manual workers from 1976 to 1991, but not among female full-time non-manual workers over the same period, or female part-timers from 1979 to 1991. Low pay was far more extensive amongst fulltime and part-time employed men in 1992 compared with 1979 (Dex et al., 1994: Tables 2.1 and 2.2).

Britain ranks lower than the USA, but higher than Spain, Luxembourg and Germany in the extent of low pay amongst male and female employees (Dex et al., 1999). Groups who are more likely to be low paid are women (although less so at the very bottom of the wage distribution), young people, ethnic minorities, people with disabilities, part-time workers, lone parents, temporary, seasonal and home workers (Dex et al., 1994; Low Pay Commission, 1998). Low pay is also more prevalent in some regions, in some industrial sectors especially in services such as hospitality and retailing, and in smaller firms.

The role of sectoral minimum wage regulation

Wages Councils were instituted in the 1950s to set minimum pay rates in the lowest paying industries, where trade union representation was low and women's representation high. These Councils were finally abolished in 1993 although partially dismantled earlier. If there were a deterioration in pay after these minimum wage regimes were dismantled, there might be a case for saying they did have an effect on pay. The abolition of six Wages Councils, 73 per cent of whose employees were women, between 1969 and 1976 was examined by Craig et al., (1982). They found evidence of a deterioration in pay and conditions following abolition, especially in the lowest grades. Under a Conservative government, in 1986, the hourly pay rates of young workers under eighteen were taken out of Wages Council control. Dolado et al. (1996) found that there was no obvious deterioration in wages in these industries after 1986, nor after the final abolition in 1993. However, the results of these studies have to be viewed in the context of the Conservative government's lack of support for minimum wages under Wages Councils. Inspectors found increasing numbers of rates below the minima being paid in the 1980s but few were prosecuted (Dex et at., 1994). In contrast, inspectors found that the numbers of payments below the minimum rates initially were relatively small in the early years of Wages Councils. For this reason, the before and after evaluations of the Dolado study probably need to be made over a longer time period, although this would pose problems for identifying the causes of any changes found.

The effects of a national minimum wage

The introduction of a minimum wage in Britain is expected to compress the wage distribution which has been shown elsewhere to be associated with greater gender wage equality (Blau and Kahn, 1994; Rosholm and Smith, 1996). The UK introduced a minimum wage of [pound]3.60 per hour for adults in April 1999. In assessing the impact of its recommended figure of [pound]3.60 per hour, the Low Pay Commission estimated that in total around two million employees should receive higher earnings; 0.5 million men and 1.5 million women; this constitutes 3 per cent of male full-timers, 26 per cent of male part-timers, 5 per cent of female full-timers and 22 per cent of female part-timers. These figures are smaller than the proportions that are defined as low paid using the more conventional definitions of low pay discussed above.

Effects on gender inequality in hourly wage rates

We have made some estimates of the effects of a [pound]3.60 minimum wage on hourly wages and gender wage ratios (at 1998 earnings levels). The calculations have been made for full- and part-timers (using the hours definition of less than 31 hours for part-timers), and for manual and non-manual employees aged 22 or more using the tax benefit model POLIMOD. The results are described in Table 1. The calculations are based on the assumption that everyone who qualifies will benefit. They do not take exemptions into account and so represent the greatest possible outcomes.

The female/male wage ratio of full-time manual and full-time non-manual workers both improved very slightly at the mean from the introduction of a [pound]3.60 minimum wage. The ratio of female part-time to male part-time non-manual workers remained unchanged, although there is some improvement when female part-timers are compared with (all) male manual workers, from 0.66 to 0.68, and a point increase in the case of the parallel non-manual comparison. The stasis seen in these figures is partly because both low paid men and women benefit from minimum wages, and partly because the threshold of [pound]3.60 is so low.

Alternative experiments

We might expect policies that act directly on differences between men and women in the labour market to have a larger effect on the gender wage ratio. One approach would be to pursue equal pay within occupations, another would be to change the occupational distribution so that men and women had the same. The first approach can only be approximated in our data on manual and non-manual strata in eighteen occupational groups. This is because these strata vary in the extent to which they embrace differentially segregated subgroups, in the extent they include vertical divisions within or between them, and in the extent to which they capture differences in human capital between men and women within each group. However, we suggest that our 'experiment' broadly removes the crowding effects of differential horizontal segregation on women's wages, although it also eliminates the effects of differential vertical segregaton and differential human capital within groups. Since the latter accounts for roughly one half of th e wage gap between male and female full timers (Chart 5), it is likely to account for less than half of the gap within occupations. The alternative approach removes any pay disadvantage to women of being over-represented in different sectors to men. There is a large element of vertical segregation between occupations (Joshi and Paci, 1998) which is eliminated by this experiment. In so far as the sex composition of the group of workers may affect their overall level of pay (Millward and Woodland, 1995), at a given level in the vertical scale, this may also be apparent in the grouped data used. Again, we are ignoring between-group differences in male and female human capital endowments. Table 1 illustrated the two approaches taken separately. The first, labelled 'women get men's pay in occupation' shows what happens if male wages in each occupational group are used as the norm. Women are given the same mean wage as men in that occupation (the occupational distribution being unchanged). The second calculation re distributes employed women through occupational categories in the same proportions as men, leaving women's wages in each occupation unchanged, 'women get similar occupations to men'.

Table 1 shows that very large changes arise from ascribing men's hourly rates of pay per broad occupation category to women. This is especially true for manual occupations where the exercise is less likely to involve the ascription of vertical mobility or additional human capital. However, it is clear that gender wage differences do remain, particularly in non-manual occupations. These differences are at least partly due to the concentration of women in low-paying occupational groups. Correcting for this instead by allocating women the same occupational distribution as men has a very small effect within manual occupations, and even lowers the relative wages of manual part-timers. The results, shown in the final column of Table 1, are near identical to the effects of a Statutory Minimum Wage. However, for non-manual workers, there is an improvement in the female/male ratio beyond both minimum wage and equal pay.

Even though these experiments do not adjust for differences in human capital, overall it is clear that policy that could deliver equal pay within occupational groups or could enforce the same occupational distribution for both sexes would be likely to have a greater impact on gender earnings ratios than the minimum wage set at [pound]3.60. This is not surprising and indeed, parallel calculations on the effects of equal pay in the USA by Figart and Lapidus (1995) point in the same direction. The reason is clear. Minimum wages only impact at the bottom of the wage distribution and affect both men and women, whereas giving women men's wages or occupations operates across all levels of wages and benefits women only.

Our calculations are useful because they show the relative size of the effects of different types of policy on the gender wage ratio as a whole, and their differential impacts on manual and non-manual workers. The value of the calculations is in what they can tell us about why, in aggregate, women's wages fall short of men's, and hence what type of policy has the most potential to reduce the shortfall. Such simple illustrations should not be interpreted as the predicted outcomes of realistic policy options. Firstly, they do not attempt to account for consequential changes should the policies be implemented. For example, under 'equal occupations' there would be insufficient jobs for women unless there was a redistribution of men's jobs, and this would also be accompanied by a redistribution of wages.

Secondly, there are serious questions about how each of these simple scenarios could be implemented in practice. The minimum wage has to be monitored and penalties imposed on employers who do not comply. The level at which the minimum is set is an important issue. However, the problems of implementing minimum wage regimes seem small in comparison with those involved with implementing equal pay within occupations or a direct policy of 'equal occupations'. The latter would involve setting, monitoring and enforcing quotas for men and women in each occupation. This has no historical precedent in the UK and it is difficult to see how it could be done in a comprehensive and sustainable way. Clearly it is only feasible under current institutional arrangements within particular occupations or professions with easily identifiable entry and exit points (such as doctors or lawyers). However, equal pay legislation does, as we have seen, have a precedent in the UK. The effective implementation of 'equal pay for equal valu e' depends on being able to determine the relative 'value' of different jobs. It is to this issue that we now turn.

Undervaluation of women's jobs in the UK

The systematic undervaluation of women's jobs has been documented in a number of studies. This process has sometimes involved male trade unionists arguing for skilled status and pay for their jobs at the expense of women. Craig et al.'s (1982) study of former Wages Council industries in the late 1970s found that 24 stamped or pressed metalware firms regarded their female press operators as more highly skilled than their male labourers, but paid the men a higher minimum time rate (p.85). Other examples which classified feminised jobs as low-skill, irrespective of their job content are given in Armstrong (1982), Coyle (1982), Crompton (1982), and Jensen (1989) from a range of different industries. Horrell et al. (1989) examined whether women would benefit more if the skill levels of their jobs were upgraded, or if they achieved equal pay for work of equal value. They concluded that a reassessment of the value of women's jobs would be of greater financial benefit to women than the upgrading of the skill level of their jobs, unless this upgrading gave them access to men's jobs at men's pay and rates of fringe benefits.

Some firms have clearly undertaken job evaluation schemes and reviewed their payment systems in order to avoid falling foul of Equal Value legislation (IRS, 1992). However such firms are few. Studies have identified a number of inhibiting factors which make it more difficult for equal pay and equal value claims to improve women's pay in the UK. The totally different pay scales which operate in men's and women's jobs prohibits many equal value comparisons being made, especially since the law in Britain has only allowed comparisons within firms (Rubery, 1992). Case studies of a range of employers found a very low level of awareness and knowledge of equality issues by personnel staff and by unions, especially at the local level (IRS, 1992; Colling and Dickens, 1989).

Job evaluation schemes were used increasingly in the 1980s, although they are more common in larger establishments, and in manufacturing, and therefore they disproportionately cover men's rather than women's jobs (IRS, 1991). Also, the stereotypes that underlie job evaluation schemes, and the undervaluation of women's skills that are built in, have often inhibited enhancements for women's jobs (Bevan and Thompson, 1992; IRS, 1991, 1992). This is part of a more extensive and systematic undervaluation of women's skills.

So at a practical level it seems likely that a statutory minimum wage is much simpler to implement than measures depending on assessments of job content, and it will have a much better chance of addressing women's position, at least at the bottom of the pay distribution.

Conclusions

One view of the evolution of women's relative wages is that it is the result of compositional change: employment at the top end of the market expanding in occupations with low discrimination, while less skilled jobs are relegated to part-timers. Alternatively, the main changes can be seen to have resulted from changes in the way the labour market rewards skills as it becomes more flexible. The first account applies to some, but not all, managerial and professional occupations. The second explains the increased dispersion in both men's and women's pay. The convergence in wage rates between men and women could have been brought about by several institutional changes, not just Equal Pay legislation. Rates of remuneration have converged for men and women in full-time jobs, but there have also been composition changes in human capital. These changes in the composition of the labour force are mirrored (if not perfectly matched) by changes in the composition of jobs, offering a partial, though not complete, explanat ion of wage change. In so far as improved wages and other equal opportunity policies have encouraged women to acquire more education and labour force experience, the convergence of women's wages towards men's is a self-generating process. Those who fail to acquire skills are excluded from the more advantageous parts of the labour market and are left further behind, with the deteriorating wages in casual, particularly part-time jobs.

The wages of men and women under 30 in full-time jobs have already come close to equality in the UK. Below that age, the education and employment experiences of male and female employees are converging. Unequal treatment of the sexes probably plays no more than a small part in the determination of the wages of young workers. The wider gap between the wages of older men and women would seem to arise from a combination of differential pay, men's greater education and la-bour market experience and mature women's family responsibilities. It is also associated with greater occupational segregation.

This article has examined a range of policies and their likely effects on female relative hourly earnings. Adopting a statutory minimum wage of [pound]3.60 was found to produce small increases in the female/male hourly rates, particularly for manual workers and part-time female employees in comparison with all men. Whilst extending the scope of equal pay or reducing occupational segregation may in principle each lead to much greater improvements in hourly ratios for women as a whole, the problems of implementing such policies are also much greater than those associated with minimum wages. Two major policy issues remain. The first is the level of the minimum wage; a higher minimum has the potential to have a greater effect on gender wage equality. The second issue concerns the development of policies that may -- indirectly if not directly -- impinge on occupational segregation and the pay of part-time workers.

(*.) Judge Institute for Management Studies, University of Cambridge, Trumpington St. Cambridge, CB2 IAG;

(**.) Department of Applied Economics, University of Cambridge, Sidgwick Avenue, Cambridge, CB3 9DE;

(***.) Centre for Longitudinal Studies, Institute of Education, 20 Bedford Way, London, WCIHOAL. A much longer version of this paper was given at the OECD Conference 'Changing Labour Markets and Gender Equality: The Role of Policy', Oslo, October 1998. Thanks are also due to two anonymous referees.

Notes

(1.) General Household Survey figures for 1995 showed that 22 per cent of women and 26 per cent of men aged 20--29 had higher education qualifications; 11 per cent of both women and men aged 20--29 had no qualifications. There were large increases in the proportions of men and women who had higher qualifications compared with 1974/75.

(2.) [pound]3.60 per hour represented 44 per cent of male median hourly earnings (full-time employees aged 18 and over in 1996 in New Earnings Survey data) compared with the Low Pay Unit definition using two-thirds the male median.

(3.) The Statutory Minimum wage, following the recommendations of The Low Pay Commission, adopted a lower minimum rate for 18--21 year olds which is why they have been excluded from this analysis.

(4.) See Redmond et al. (1998) for more detail. Our calculations do not take taxes and benefits into account in this article. They are based on 1995/6 Family Expenditure Survey data updated to 1998/9 levels using disaggregate information about earnings from the New Earnings Survey. Material from the Family Expenditure Survey is Crown Copyright; it has been made available by the Office for National Statistics through the Data Archive, University of Essex and has been used by permission. Neither the ONS nor the Data Archive bear any responsibility for the analysis or interpretation of the data reported here.

(5.) The calculations exclude four outliers and also assume first round effects; that is they do not consider the possibility of employment changes, wage differential changes, inflation effects or changes in turnover.

(6.) These ratios are calculated within the part-time, full-time manual and non-manual groups. Where women are given the average hourly wage for men, this was done within occupational groups, regardless of hours of work.

(7.) This procedure used the following 18 socio-economic groups: (1) Employer -- large establishment; (2) Manager -- large establishment; (3) Employer -- small establishment; (4) Manager -- small establishment; (5) Professional workers -- self-employed; (6) Professional workers -- employees; (7) Ancillary workers and artists; (8) Foremen and supervisors -- non-manual; (9) Junior non-manual workers; (I) Personal service workers; (II) Foremen and supervisors -- manual; (12) Manual workers -- skilled; (13) Manual workers -- semi-skilled; (14) Manual workers -- unskilled; (15) Own account not professional; (16) Farmers -- employers and managers; (17) Farmers -- own account; (18) Agricultural workers. These are the grouped categories available in the Family Expenditure Survey and are different from those possible in the New Earnings Survey used by Elias and Gregory.

(8.) It should be noted that a simulation of a combination of the 'equal pay' and 'equal occupations' scenarios would automatically produce an aggregate gender wage ratio of unity. Thus the effects of human capital differences and any vertical segregation within the broad occupational groups are ignored.

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