Age and Gender Differences in Job Opportunities

Abstract

There are only a few pieces of literature on age-specific occupational segregation. In this descriptive paper, I focus on occupational opportunities for newly-hired older male and female workers. This study is an enriched replication study of Hutchens (ILRR, 1988), who showed that firms employ older workers, but hire them less often than they hire younger ones. I use a rich dataset for West Germany with information covering almost thirty years, the regional file of the IAB Employment Sample (IABS-R04). By drawing segregation curves and calculating different measures, such as the Dissimilarity Index and the Hutchens Square Root Segregation Index, I find clear evidence that age-related segregation exists. While newly-hired workers in the age groups of 18 to 34 years and 35 to 54 years are quite similarly distributed in terms of the indices, those in the oldest age group, aged 55 years and above, and especially older women, are more segregated. Differences for older male and female workers over time may be explained by changes in labor and retirement policies.