Formal and informal gender wage gaps: the impact of trade liberalization in Brazil

Trade liberalization is closely associated with competitive shocks which generate differentiated effects in the formal and informal sectors, especially in developing countries. We use the Brazilian trade liberalization episode in early 1990 as a natural experiment to test Becker’s theory on discrimi...

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Detalhes bibliográficos
Autor: Rocha, Pedro Henrique Cavalcanti
Tipo de documento: dissertação
Estado:Versão publicada
Data de publicação:2020
País:Brasil
Recursos:Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB)
Repositório:Biblioteca Digital de Teses e Dissertações da UFPB
Idioma:português
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.ufpb.br:123456789/24203
Acesso em linha:https://repositorio.ufpb.br/jspui/handle/123456789/24203
Access Level:Acceso aberto
Palavra-chave:Liberalização do comércio
Heterogeneidade da firma
Informalidade
Desigualdade salarial de gênero
Trade liberalization
Firm heterogeneity
Informality
Gender wage gap
CNPQ::CIENCIAS SOCIAIS APLICADAS::ECONOMIA
Descrição
Resumo:Trade liberalization is closely associated with competitive shocks which generate differentiated effects in the formal and informal sectors, especially in developing countries. We use the Brazilian trade liberalization episode in early 1990 as a natural experiment to test Becker’s theory on discrimination, but including the informal sector. In our model, heterogeneity on the firm’s productivity and discrimination explain the effects of trade liberalization on the gender wage gap in the formal and informal sector. The model establishes a causal link between trade reform, firm productivity change, and reallocation of discriminatory firms between sectors, which implicate in varied effects of trade liberalization on the average gender wage gap and discrimination. Overall results indicate that a reduction in 1 % in tariff decreases the gender wage gap between 3% to 8% in the formal sector and increases the gender wage gap between 5% to 8% in the informal sector.