Is there an urban wage premium for women?

Abstract

"Regional opportunity structures have been increasingly considered in theoretical and empirical investigations of workers' labor market success and career trajectories. Focusing on urban versus rural labor markets we investigate if labor market location affects wages of men and women differently. We thereby try to separate locational effects that arise due to differences in the structural mix of urban versus rural areas from effects that are merely related to the dissimilar distribution of human capital across regions. We thereby also seek to indentify so-called agglomeration effects, which arise from the size and density per se. Moreover, trying to overcome difficulties of regression-based approaches, we apply a difference-in-difference technique based on propensity score matching. This methodology allows us to simultaneously and appropriately take account of several control groups, which we consider crucial for assessing the research question adequately. Our results indicate that for equally productive workers urban regions offer better employment opportunities in terms of wages earned. This wage premium is indeed larger for females and can be mostly attributed to occupational, industry and firm composition of metropolitan areas that seem to offer relatively more favorable conditions for females. However, we don't find evidence that beyond these structural effects that there is an positive agglomeration effect per se." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Cite article

Krug, G. & Nisic, N. (2011): Is there an urban wage premium for women? A difference-in-differences analysis using propensity score matching. (LASER discussion papers 54), Erlangen, 16 p.