Gender and Competition: Evidence from Academic Promotions in France

34 Pages Posted: 28 Oct 2013

See all articles by Clément Bosquet

Clément Bosquet

Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne - Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne (CES)

Pierre-Philippe Combes

Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po) - Department of Economics; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

C. Garcia-Peñalosa

National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) - GREQAM; CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute)

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: October 2013

Abstract

Differences in promotion across genders are still prevalent in many occupations. Recent work based on experimental evidence indicates that women participate less in or exert lower effort during contests. We exploit the unique features of the promotion system for French academics to look at women's attitudes towards competition in an actual labour market. Using data for academic economists over the period 1991-2008 we find that, conditional on entering the competition, there is no difference in promotions across the genders, which is di cult to reconcile with either discrimination or a poorer performance of women in contests. In contrast, women have a substantially lower probability than men to enter the promotion contest. Our data does not support that this gap is due to differences in costs or in preferences concerning department prestige, indicating that women are less willing than men to take part in contests.

Keywords: academic labour markets, gender gaps, promotions

JEL Classification: I23, J16, J7

Suggested Citation

Bosquet, Clément and Combes, Pierre-Philippe and Garcia-Penalosa, Cecilia, Gender and Competition: Evidence from Academic Promotions in France (October 2013). CEPR Discussion Paper No. DP9711, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2346248

Clément Bosquet (Contact Author)

Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne - Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne (CES) ( email )

106-112 Boulevard de l'hopital
106-112 Boulevard de l'Hôpital
Paris Cedex 13, 75647
France

Pierre-Philippe Combes

Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po) - Department of Economics ( email )

28, rue des Saints peres
Paris, 75007
France

HOME PAGE: http://https://www.gate.cnrs.fr/ppcombes

Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

London
United Kingdom

Cecilia Garcia-Penalosa

National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) - GREQAM ( email )

Centre de la Vieille Charité
2, rue de la Charité
Marseille, 13002
France
+33 491 140746 (Phone)
+33 491 900227 (Fax)

CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute)

Poschinger Str. 5
Munich, DE-81679
Germany

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