Occupational segregation and income gap by gender and race in brazil: An age group analysis

Abstract

In the past 30 years, Brazil strengthened labor market structural change on aspects related to occupational modernization, feminine participation and Higher Education expansion. In this regard, younger cohorts entered in a different context than those who entered in past decades. Thus, this research aims to measure occupational segregation and wage disparities by gender and race over three age groups. Therefore, the questions are: Is occupational segregation lower among younger people? Does it reflect on lower wage inequality? These questions are analyzed through segregation and wage decomposition from PNAD 2015 on a sample for people with Higher Education. These results point out to lower inequality among the youngest people, but doubts remain as to whether these are age or cohort effects. In this regard, the segregation index for the cohort between 26 and 35 years old in 2015 is compared to the same age range in 1995 and 2005, focusing on isolated cohort and age effects. In the end, it is pointed out that age is more associated with increasing inequality than with cohort, although segregation by race is lower among the younger cohort.