Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/272408 
Year of Publication: 
2022
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 15781
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We study the gender pay gap in the labor market for CEOs by analysing 1,174 outsider CEO successions over the past three decades across 18 countries. We find that male and female CEOs receive a similar compensation overall but this masks marked gender differences in the pay structure: namely, women CEOs receive a lower proportion of fixed to total compensation than comparable men. We interpret this outcome as the result of gendered risk preferences, which exacerbate the pay gap when there is bargaining over pay, and contribute a theoretical model of the CEO labor market to formalise this intuition. The model also suggests that a more balanced gender composition in companies' boards can help women close the gap in pay structure—an hypothesis that is empirically supported in our data.
Subjects: 
CEO compensation
women CEOs
board diversity
corporate governance
JEL: 
J16
J31
G39
M59
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
741.89 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.