Abstract

Although significant progress has been made in recent decades toward achieving gender equality in the German labor market, substantial differences in pay persist. One of the main drivers of wage disparities is gender-based occupational choice, which remains largely unchanged despite numerous government initiatives. Women, particularly those with low and medium qualifications, are much more likely to choose typical "female occupations," such as in nursing or early childhood education, whereas men tend to opt for typical "male occupations," such as in manufacturing. Since jobs predominantly held by men are generally better paid than those dominated by women, gendered occupational choices are expected to continue shaping the wage gap between women and men in the future. In this project, we aim to analyze two school reforms in East Germany that led to a majority of women beginning vocational training in one year, while predominantly men started training in another year. As a result, there were years in which women or men entered the labor market without direct competition from the opposite gender. The goal of our study is to determine whether this natural experiment caused women and men to more frequently choose occupations that are atypical for their gender and how these atypical career choices affected their long-term professional trajectories. Given the persistent gender pay gap in the German labor market, such an investigation is essential to gain a deeper understanding of labor market dynamics.