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Pay transparency intervention and the gender pay gap: evidence from research‐intensive universities in the UK

Author

Listed:
  • Gamage, Danula K.
  • Kavetsos, Georgios
  • Mallick, Sushanta
  • Sevilla, Almudena
Abstract
This study investigates the impact of a pay transparency intervention in reducing the gender pay gap in the UK university sector. Introduced in 2007, the initiative enabled public access to average annual earnings disaggregated by gender in UK universities. We use a detailed matched employee-employer administrative dataset that follows individuals over time, allowing us to adopt a quasi-experimental approach based on event studies around the intervention. We find that the earnings of female academics increased by around 0.62 percentage points compared to their male counterparts as the control group, whose earnings remained constant after the pay transparency intervention, reducing the gender pay gap by 4.37 per cent. Further evidence suggests that the main mechanism for the fall in the pay gap is driven by female employees negotiating higher wages, particularly among senior female academics.

Suggested Citation

  • Gamage, Danula K. & Kavetsos, Georgios & Mallick, Sushanta & Sevilla, Almudena, 2023. "Pay transparency intervention and the gender pay gap: evidence from research‐intensive universities in the UK," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 120850, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:120850
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • R14 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Land Use Patterns
    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General

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