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The Old Boys' Club: Schmoozing and the Gender Gap

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  • Zoë B. Cullen
  • Ricardo Perez-Truglia

Abstract

Offices are social places. Employees and managers take breaks together and talk about family and hobbies. In this study, we show that employees’ social interactions with their managers can be advantageous for their careers, and that this phenomenon contributes to the gender pay gap. We use administrative and survey data from a large financial institution and exploit quasi-random variation induced by the rotation of managers. We provide evidence that when employees have more face-to-face interactions with their managers, they are promoted at a higher rate. This mechanism could explain a third of the gender gap in promotions at this firm.

Suggested Citation

  • Zoë B. Cullen & Ricardo Perez-Truglia, 2019. "The Old Boys' Club: Schmoozing and the Gender Gap," NBER Working Papers 26530, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:26530
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    Cited by:

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    2. Abi Adams-Prassl & Kristiina Huttunen & Emily Nix & Ning Zhang, 2022. "Violence against women at work," Economics Series Working Papers 979, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    3. Yannis Galanakis & Amanda Gosling, 2024. "Mind the (Gender Pay) Gap - The role of Board Gender Composition," Working Papers 045, The Productivity Institute.
    4. Azmat, Ghazala & Boring, Anne, 2020. "Gender Diversity in Firms," IZA Policy Papers 168, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Flory, Jeffrey A. & Leibbrandt, Andreas & Rott, Christina & Stoddard, Olga B., 2021. "Signals from On High and the Power of Growth Mindset: A Natural Field Experiment in Attracting Minorities to High-Profile Positions," IZA Discussion Papers 14383, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Raja Kali & David Pastoriza & Jean-François Plante & Ekaterina Turkina, 2024. "Migrants Networks and Survival in the Job: Evidence from Foreign Newcomers on the PGA Tour," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 25(4), pages 443-471, May.
    7. Forth, John & Theodoropoulos, Nikolaos, 2022. "Earnings Discrimination in the Workplace," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1110, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    8. Jakob Alfitian & Marvin Deversi & Dirk Sliwka, 2023. "Closing the Gender Gap in Salary Increases: Evidence from a Field Experiment on Promoting Pay Equity," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 244, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    9. Gerald J. Pruckner & Flora Stiftinger & Katrin Zocher, 2024. "When women take over: Physician gender and health care provision," Economics working papers 2024-04, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J7 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination
    • Z1 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

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