The gender wage gap among graduate employees in Malta

Abstract

This study investigates whether a gender wage gap exists among graduate employees in Malta. Moreover, this study attempts to determine which factors including gender, affect the wage rates of such employees. To reach this objective, this study makes use of primary data collected through an online survey, among graduate employees in Malta, aged over 20 years. The first analysis carried out is a descriptive analysis for all valid responses, from which a number of tendencies are derived. This is followed by a regression analysis, whereby both OLS and quantile regression methods are adopted to determine, which factors explain the hourly wage rate among Maltese graduate employees. The survey data suggests that, although both sexes in this study are graduates thus possessing similar educational level, in general Maltese females on average, do earn a lower annual pay when compared to their male counterparts. Findings that emerged from the regression analysis indicate that gender is a significant variable in explaining variations in hourly wage rate, among graduates. Results show that along with gender, other explanatory variables including child responsibilities, type of occupation, education and starting wage, also play a vital role in explaining this pay gap between sexes.