Why Are So Few Females Promoted into CEO and Vice-President Positions? Danish Empirical Evidence 1997-2007

In most OECD countries, only very few women succeed in reaching top executive positions. In this paper, the probability of promotion into VP and CEO positions is estimated based on employer-employee data on all Danish companies observed during the period 1997-2007. After controlling for a large number of family-related variables, including take-up history of maternity and paternity leave and proxies for 'female-friendly' companies, there is still a considerable gap in the promotion probabilities for CEO positions, but not for VP positions. Thus, the results cannot confirm recent theories on 'belief flipping' or disappearance of statistical discrimination against women who succeed getting into career track positions. The results reflect that the hiring decision and the decision to enter a top position as 'number one', i.e. CEO, in the organization is very different from the decision to hire or become VP, i.e. 'number two' or lower.promotion, top executive positions, statistical discrimination

The Gender Pay Gap in Top Corporate Jobs in Denmark: Glass Ceilings, Sticky Floors or Both?

This paper analyses the gender gap in compensation for CEOs, Vice-Directors, and potential top executives in the 2000 largest Danish private companies based on a panel data set of employer-employees data covering the period 1996-2005. During the period, the overall gender gap in compensation for top executives and potential top executives decreased from 35 percent to 31 percent. However, contrary to many other studies, we do not find that the gender gap for Danish top executives disappears when controlling for observed individual and firm characteristics and unobserved individual heterogeneity. For CEOs, the raw compensation gap is 28 percent during the period while the estimated compensation gap after controlling for observed and unobserved characteristics increases to 30 percent. For executives below the CEO level, the estimated compensation gap is lower, ranging from 15 to 20 percent. Thus, we find evidence of both glass ceilings and sticky floors in Danish private firms.CEO compensation, gender gap, glass ceiling

The educational attainment of the children of the Danish ‘guest worker’ immigrants

This paper analyses the educational attainment of young first generation immigrants in Denmark who are children of the ‘guest workers’ who immigrated from Turkey, Pakistan and Ex-Yugoslavia in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Beside the traditional intergenerational transmission mechanism, we analyse potential immigrant-specific factors as language proficiency, attending mother-tongue courses and expectations concerning out or return migration from Denmark. The results show that generational transmission effects are strong among ‘guest worker’ immigrants, especially among men. Other important factors are Danish language proficiency, age at first marriage and a number variables reflecting parents’ and own attitudes concerning education, marriage and family. However, the ‘guest worker’ immigrants are not a homogenous group. The analyses reveal large differences between Turkish, Pakistani and Ex-Jugoslavian ‘guest workers’ with respect to their educational success and the factors behind.Education; ‘guest worker’ immigrants; intergenerational transmission

Do Women in Top Management Affect Firm Performance? A Panel Study of 2500 Danish Firms

Corporate governance literature argues that board diversity is potentially positively related to firm performance. This study examines the relationship in the case of women in top executive jobs and on boards of directors. We use data for the 2500 largest Danish firms observed during the period 1993–2001 and find that the proportion of women in top management jobs tends to have positive effects on firm performance, even after controlling for numerous characteristics of the firm and direction of causality. The results show that the positive effects of women in top management depend on the qualifications of female top managers.firm performance; female CEOs; gender diversity

Career Interruptions due to Parental Leave - A Comparative Study of Denmark and Sweden

Parental leave mandates are associated with high female employment rates, but with reductions in relative female wages if leave is of extended duration. We analyze the impact of family policies (parental leave and childcare prices) of Denmark and Sweden on women’s career breaks due to childbirth. These countries are culturally similar and share the same type of welfare state ideology, but differ remarkably in pursued family policies. Our analysis takes advantage of the availability of comparable longitudinal data and allows us to estimate parallel models across the two countries. The impact of family policies and economic incentives on the probability of returning to the labor market is estimated using a duration model approach. Our results show that economic incentives affect the behavior of mothers in both countries. However, the parental leave mandates as such are very important determinants for the observed behavior. Based on policy simulations we find that if fathers were given more parental leave, it would promote the labor supply of women.Maternal Leave; Parental Leave; Childcare; Family Policy; Mothers’ Labor Supply

Overtime work, dual job holding and taxation

Traditionally, labour supply data do not include much information on hours and wages in secondary job or overtime work. In this paper, we estimate labour supply models based on survey information on hours and wages in overtime work and second job which is merged to detailed register information on income taxes, deductions, taxable income etc. We also allow for the effect of observed fixed costs in main occupation and unobserved fixed costs in second job, and a ‘stigmatization effect’ from unemployment. The estimated models follow a ‘Hausman-approach’. The results indicate that the labour supply elasticities are highly sensitive to the inclusion of information on overtime work and secondary job and to the handling of fixed costs of work. The estimated elasticities are numerically larger when explicit information on overtime and second job work is taken into account compared to traditional labour supply models without explicit information on overtime pay and second job wages. However, when the model allows for stigmatization effects and unobserved fixed costs of work in second job, the resulting elasticities reduce considerably.Labour supply; Dual job holding; Overtime work; Piecewise linear budget constraints

Increasing the Sensitivity of Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) Chemical Sensors and other Chemical Sensing Investigations

The work involves the fabrication and testing of three different surface acoustic wave (SAW) device designs, an investigation of nanowires sensitive to chemicals and preconcentrator prototypes to include with chemical sensors. The SAW chemical sensor designs include modifications to a basic SAW device to see if the sensitivity of the SAW device is increased. The modifications consist of etched trenches along the propagation field, coating the device with carbon nanotubes (CNTs) under the chemically sensitive layer and coating CNTs on top of the chemically sensitive layer. SAW devices are coated with Nafion®, a polymer sensitive to ethanol. The tests indicate that trenches etched between the transducer fields increase the sensitivity of the SAW devices. The increase of sensitivity is signified by a shift of peak frequency of an extra 100kHz over the unaltered device after five minutes of flowing ethanol. Testing of the nanowires involves measuring the resistance of palladium, polypyrrole and polyaniline nanowires. Investigation of the nanowires indicates that they are less suited to detecting chemicals in a non-ideal measurement circumstance than SAW devices. Preconcentrators are another way to improve the sensitivity of chemical sensors. Some preconcentrator prototypes fabricated in the PolyMUMPs™ system are tested and evaluated for heating characteristics and abilities. A grid pattern presents the best way to heat a large surface area the most uniformly. Coating the devices with CNTs also increases the heat to which devices can be heated and decreases the amount of time that it takes to heat the devices

"Contributing to most things": Richard Marsh, literary production, and the Fin de Siècle periodicals market

Franco Moretti has recently called for a "distant reading" which "focus[es] on units that are much smaller or much larger than the text: devices, themes, tropes - or genres and systems." For Moretti, such a reading involves a "process of deliberate reduction and abstraction," which produces "artificial constructs - graphs, maps, trees" and results in "a specific form of knowledge " quite different from "traditional" close readings of canonical literature. This article builds on Moretti's work, offering a statistical case study of the professional practice - production rates, generic choices, and writing patterns - of the bestselling popular author "Richard Marsh" (1857-1915). While the resulting graphs indicate patterns and trends in the career of one professional writer, their abstract nature also suggests ways in which we might approach the work of other authors, indeed, authorship itself, through statistical analysis

A rapid culture independent methodology to quantitatively detect and identify common human bacterial pathogens associated with contaminated high purity water

Background: Water and High Purity Water (HPW) distribution systems can be contaminated with human pathogenic microorganisms. This biocontamination may pose a risk to human health as HPW is commonly used in the industrial, pharmaceutical and clinical sectors. Currently, routine microbiological testing of HPW is performed using slow and labour intensive traditional microbiological based techniques. There is a need to develop a rapid culture independent methodology to quantitatively detect and identify biocontamination associated with HPW. Results: A novel internally controlled 5-plex real-time PCR Nucleic Acid Diagnostics assay (NAD), was designed and optimised in accordance with Minimum Information for Publication of Quantitative Real-Time PCR Experiments guidelines, to rapidly detect, identify and quantify the human pathogenic bacteriaStenotrophomonas maltophilia, Burkholderia species, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Serratia marcescenswhich are commonly associated with the biocontamination of water and water distribution systems. The specificity of the 5-plex assay was tested against genomic DNA isolated from a panel of 95 microorganisms with no cross reactivity observed. The analytical sensitivities of the S. maltophilia, B. cepacia, P. aeruginosa and the S. marcescens assays are 8.5, 5.7, 3.2 and 7.4 genome equivalents respectively. Subsequently, an analysis of HPW supplied by a Millipore Elix 35 water purification unit performed using standard microbiological methods revealed high levels of naturally occurring microbiological contamination. Five litre water samples from this HPW delivery system were also filtered and genomic DNA was purified directly from these filters. These DNA samples were then tested using the developed multiplex real-time PCR NAD assay and despite the high background microbiological contamination observed, both S. maltophilia andBurkholderia species were quantitatively detected and identified. At both sampling points the levels of both S. maltophilia and Burkholderia species present was above the threshold of 10 cfu/100 ml recommended by both EU and US guidelines. Conclusions: The novel culture independent methodology described in this study allows for rapid (<5 h), quantitative detection and identification of these four human pathogens from biocontaminated water and HPW distribution systems. We propose that the described NAD assay and associated methodology could be applied to routine testing of water and HPW distribution systems to assure microbiological safety and high water quality standards