When More is Less

Using a nationally representative survey of work organizations, we test whether the earnings penalty associated with work that is done primarily by women exists at the level of jobs within work organizations. Additionally, we bring theory and research on organizations to bear on this question, enabling us to test theoretically salient interactions between the sex composition of jobs and measures of organizational structure and environment. Our results corroborate prior research showing strong negative effects of female representation on work rewards, net of a diverse array of control variables. We find this penalty to be exceedingly robust, with neither government regulation, firm size, nor employment formalization attenuating the negative effect of female representation on earnings.

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