This study investigates how marketization and other forces affect gender earnings in reform-era urban China. Given the lack of longitudinal data, I analyze the sample data from the 2005 China population mini-census to approximate temporal trends with variations across sectors and regions. I show that while the gender earnings gap is smallest in government and public institutions, it increases as the sector becomes more marketized. Furthermore, I match the mini-census data with prefecture-level statistics and simultaneously differentiate the effect of economic development and marketization on gender earnings inequality. The results show that marketization and economic development forces affect gender inequality in different ways: while marketization has increased gender earnings inequali...[ Read more ]

This study investigates how marketization and other forces affect gender earnings in reform-era urban China. Given the lack of longitudinal data, I analyze the sample data from the 2005 China population mini-census to approximate temporal trends with variations across sectors and regions. I show that while the gender earnings gap is smallest in government and public institutions, it increases as the sector becomes more marketized. Furthermore, I match the mini-census data with prefecture-level statistics and simultaneously differentiate the effect of economic development and marketization on gender earnings inequality. The results show that marketization and economic development forces affect gender inequality in different ways: while marketization has increased gender earnings inequality, economic development has offset it. Market forces appear to be the main cause of rising gender earnings inequality in urban China.