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Why Are Women Paid Less than Men, but Given Higher Raises?

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Abstract

We replicated and extended a largely ignored pattern of findings in the literature, namely, that women receive lower base pay but higher pay increases than men within the same organization. Despite the fact that we were able to explain about 95% of the variance in base pay, gender differences remained. We found that unequal starting pay was a significant factor in subsequent base pay. In addition, we compared two explanations for the finding that women receive higher pay raises than men. The results suggested that structural features of the pay increase system, rather than the reduction of stereotypes, seemed to account for women receiving higher pay increases.

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Harris, M.M., Gilbreath, B. & Sunday, J.A. Why Are Women Paid Less than Men, but Given Higher Raises?. Journal of Business and Psychology 16, 499–514 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015426932323

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015426932323

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