Gender and Ethnic Wage Gaps in Guatemala from a Matching Comparisons Perspective

This paper analyzes gender and ethnic wage gaps in Guatemala for the period 2000-2006, applying a matching comparisons technique, finding pronounced wage gaps along both gender and ethnic dimensions, the latter being greater. Wage gaps in Guatemala are partially explained by differences in human capital characteristics, especially education, between indigenous and non-indigenous and males and females, which calls for equalization of educational opportunities for the population. However, wage gaps are greater than differences in education would predict, which suggests the need for interventions: information campaigns to generate consciousness regarding the need to provide more equal opportunities in labor markets according to each individual’s productivity.

Discriminación en América Latina: Eso que (casi) todos vemos? (Discrimination in Latin America: An Elephant in the Room?)

Este trabajo investiga la evidencia de discriminación en América Latina y muestra que hay una percepción generalizada de discriminación, especialmente en contra del pobre, el no instruído y aquellos que carecen de conecciones. Los canales a través de los cuales la discriminación ocurre se construyen en base a factores económicos. Sin embargo, mientras las encuestas de percepción son informativas, éstas son menos que ideales para ayudar a precisar el alcance y los mecanismos relacionados. Evidencia experimental reciente sugiere que hay poca cabida para prácticas discriminatorias en la región. Esta aparente contradicción en donde los individuos perciben que hay discriminación en el aire, pero pocos actúan discriminatoriamente, es consistente con una explicación acerca de estereotipos que desaparecen cuando los flujos de información funcionan bien.

Returns to Private Education in Peru

The private provision of educational services has been representing an increasing fraction of the Peruvian schooling system, especially in recentdecades. While there have been many claims about the differences in quality between private and public schools, there is no complete assessment of the different impacts of these two type of providers on the labor markets. This paper attempts to provide such a comprehensive overview by exploring private-public differences in the individual returns to education in Urban Peru. Exploiting a rich pair of data sets (ENNIV 1997 and 2000) that include questions on type of education (public vs. private) for each educational level (primary, secondary, technical tertiary and university tertiary) to a representative sample of adults, this paper measures the differences in labor earnings for all possible educational trajectories. The results indicate higher returns to education for those who attended private schools than those who attended the public system. Nonetheless, these higher returns also show higher dispersion, reflecting wider quality heterogeneity within the private system. The private-public differences in returns are more pronounced at the secondary than at any other educational level. On the other hand, the private-public differences in returns from technical education are almost nonexistent. A cohort approach paired with a rolling-windows technique allows us to capture generational evolutions of the private-public differences. The results indicate that these differences have been increasing during the last two decades.

The Gender Wage Gap in Chile 1992-2003 from a Matching Comparisons Perspective

This paper analyzes the evolution of the gender wage gap in Chile during the period 1992 to 2003 using the decomposition approach developed in Ñopo (2004). This approach, which decomposes the wage gap into four additive elements, stresses the need for comparisons inside the common support for the distributions of observable characteristics of individuals. Also, it allows an analysis of the distribution of unexplained differences in wages (not only the averages). The results suggest that, besides the high educational attainment of females, there are noticeable gender wage gaps in Chile favoring males. These unexplained differences in wages, which move around 25 percent of average female wages, show no clear tendency during the period of analysis. The wage gaps are higher at the highest percentiles of the wage distribution, among those with higher educational attainment, among directors and among part-time workers. The technique also detects some evidence of a glass-ceiling effect in Chilean labor markets, such that for some occupations and particular combinations of observable characteristics, there are highly paid males but not females.

The gender wage gap in Peru 1986-2000: evidence from a matching comparisons approach

Applying the methodology developed in Ñopo (2004), I analyze the evolution of the gender wage gap in Peru from 1986 to 2000. The advantage of such methodology is two-fold. First, it recognizes that the supports of observable characteristics distributions differ substantially. Second, it provides deeper insights regarding the distribution of the unexplained gender differences in earnings. For the period under analysis, males earn on average 45% more than females. This wage gap is composed of three additive elements: 11% differences in supports, 6% differences in distributions of individual characteristics and 28% unexplainable differences. About half of these unexplainable differences occur in the highest quintile of the wage distribution.Instituto de Investigaciones Económica

The Persistent Gender Earnings Gap in Colombia, 1994-2006

This paper surveys gender wage gaps in Colombia from 1994 to 2006, using matchingcomparisons to examine the extent to which individuals with similar human capitalcharacteristics earn different wages. Three sub-periods are considered: 1994-1998; 2000-2001; and 2002- 2006. The gaps dropped from the first to the second period but remained almost unchanged between the second and the third. The gender wage gap remains largely unexplained after controlling for different combinations of socio-demographics and job-related characteristics, reaching between 13 and 23 percent of average female wages. That gap is lower at the middle of the wage distributions than the extremes, possibly due to a gender-equalizing effect of the minimum wage. Moreover, the gap is more pronounced for low-productivity workers and those who need flexibility to participate in labor markets. This suggests that policy interventions in the form of labor market regulations may have little impact on reducing gender wage gaps.gender, ethnicity, wage gaps, Latin America, Colombia, matching

Fuerzas tradicionales de exclusión: Una revisión de la literatura cuantitativa sobre la situación económica de los pueblos indígenas, afrodescendientes y personas con discapacidad

(Disponible en inglés) La distribución desigual de riqueza en América Latina y el Caribe esta ligada a la distribución desigual de activos (humanos y físicos) y al acceso diferenciado a los mercados y servicios. Estas circunstancias, y las correspondientes tensiones sociales, deben ser entendidas en términos de fuerzas tradicionales de exlcusión; los sectores de la población que experimentan resultados desfavorables también pueden ser reconocidos por características como etnicidad, raza, género y discapacidaes físicas. Además de revisar la literatura en exclusión social, este trabajo revisa diferentes tópicos: (i) deprivación relativa (en tierra y vivienda, infraestructura física, salud e ingresos); (ii) temas de los mercados de trabajo, incluyendo acceso a los mercados en general, así como informalidad, segregación y discriminación; (iii) los puntos de transacción de representación política, protección social y violencia; y (iv) áreas en las que el análisis aun es débil y avenidas para mayor investigación en la región.

Measuring the Relative Pay of Latin American School Teachers at the turn of the 20th Century

How much are teachers paid in comparison to those in other professions in Latin America? How have these differences evolved at the turn of the 20th century? This paper documents the extent to which teachers are underpaid vis‐à‐vis workers in other professional and technical occupations in thirteen Latin‐American countries circa 2007. It also analyses the evolution of the earnings gaps between circa 1997 and circa 2007. After controlling the earnings differentials by observable characteristics linked to productivity, using the methodology developed in Ñopo (2008), we find that teachers are underpaid vis‐à‐vis other professionals and technicians in Latin America in both periods: circa 1997 and circa 2007. This has been the case for hourly earnings gaps at the main and secondary jobs. However, the analysis performed provides evidence that the earnings gap decreased during the decade of analysis, most of the drop is attributed to a general trend in earnings gap reduction rather than as a result of teachers’ improvements on their observable characteristics. The earnings gap shows important heterogeneities, across countries and along the earnings distributions

Evolution of Teachers’ Salaries in Latin America at the Turn of the 20th Century : How Much Are They (Under or Over) Paid?

How much are teachers paid in comparison to those in other professions in Latin America? How have these differences evolved at the turn of the 20th century? This paper reports the evolution, between circa 1997 and circa 2007, of teachers´ salaries vis-à-vis workers in other professional and technical occupations for thirteen Latin-American countries. After controlling the earnings differentials by observable characteristics linked to productivity it is found that the hourly earnings gap, although substantial, decreased throughout the decade. This has been the case for earnings gaps at the main and secondary jobs, and also for those measured in terms of monthly and yearly earnings. Nonetheless, behind the region averages there is an important cross-country heterogeneity

To What Extent do Latin Americans Trust and Cooperate? Field Experiments on Social Exclusion In Six Latin American Countries

This paper explores the extent to which individuals trust, reciprocate, cooperate and pool risk by using a battery of field experiments containing the trust game, the voluntary contributions mechanism and the risk pooling game; applied in six capital cities in Latin America. The results suggest that: (i) on average, the propensity to trust and cooperate among Latin Americans is remarkably similar to that found in other regions of the world; (ii) expectations about the behavior of other players are the main driver of trust, reciprocity and cooperation; and (iii) behaviors involving socialization, trust and cooperation are closely interconnected.