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Information and the Persistence of the Gender Wage Gap: Early Evidence from California's Salary History Ban

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  • Benjamin Hansen
  • Drew McNichols

Abstract

Aiming to reduce the gender wage gap, several states and cities have recently adopted legislation that prohibits employers from asking about previously earned salaries. The advocates of these salary history bans (SHBs) have suggested pay history perpetuates past discrimination. We study the early net impact of the first state-wide SHBs. Using both difference-in-difference and synthetic control approaches, we find the gender earnings ratio increased by 1 percent in states with SHBs. We find these population wide increases are driven by an increase of the gender earnings ratio for households with all children over 5 years old, by workers over 35, and are principally driven by those who have recently switched jobs.

Suggested Citation

  • Benjamin Hansen & Drew McNichols, 2020. "Information and the Persistence of the Gender Wage Gap: Early Evidence from California's Salary History Ban," NBER Working Papers 27054, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27054
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    Cited by:

    1. Francesco Capozza, 2024. "Beliefs about the Gender Gap in Salary Negotiations," CESifo Working Paper Series 11228, CESifo.
    2. Sourav Sinha, 2022. "US Salary History Bans -- Strategic Disclosure by Job Applicants and the Gender Pay Gap," Papers 2202.03602, arXiv.org.
    3. Mask, Joshua, 2023. "Salary history bans and healing scars from past recessions," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    4. Jack Blundell, 2021. "Wage responses to gender pay gap reporting requirements," CEP Discussion Papers dp1750, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    5. James Bessen & Erich Denk & Chen Meng, 2024. "Perpetuating wage inequality: evidence from salary history bans," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 22(3), pages 709-733, September.
    6. Blundell, Jack, 2021. "Wage responses to gender pay gap reporting requirements," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 114416, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    7. Eliot L. Sherman & Raina Brands & Gillian Ku, 2023. "Dropping Anchor: A Field Experiment Assessing a Salary History Ban with Archival Replication," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(5), pages 2919-2932, May.
    8. Cortes, Patricia & Pan, Jessica & Pilossoph, Laura & Zafar, Basit, 2021. "Gender Differences in Job Search and the Earnings Gap: Evidence from Business Majors," IZA Discussion Papers 14373, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J3 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • J42 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Monopsony; Segmented Labor Markets
    • J48 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Particular Labor Markets; Public Policy
    • J58 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Public Policy
    • J7 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination
    • K0 - Law and Economics - - General

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