It pays to be happy (if you are a man): Subjective wellbeing and the gender wage gap in Urban China

International Journal of Manpower

Volumn 35, Issue 3, 2014, Pages 392-414

  Mishra, Vinod ^a   Smyth, Russell ^a  

^a MONASH UNIVERSITY   (Australia)

Author keywords

China; Gender; Subjective wellbeing; Wage gap

Indexed keywords

EID: 84902476063     PISSN: 01437720     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1108/IJM-07-2013-0184     Document Type: Article

References (70)

1. Babcock, L., Laschever, S. (2003), Women Don't Ask: Negotiation and the Gender Divide, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ.
2. Babcock, L., Gelfand, M., Small, D., Stayn, H. (2006), "Gender differences in the propensity to initiate negotiations" in Cremer, D.D., Zeelenberg, M. and Murninghan, J.K. (Eds.), Social Psychology and Economics, Lawrence Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ, pp. 239-259.
3. Bao, K., Lyubomirsky, S. (2012), "The rewards of happiness" David, S., Boniwell, I. and Conley Ayres, A. (Eds.), Oxford Handbook of Happiness, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
4. Belfield, C.R., Kelly, I.R. (2010), "The benefits of breastfeeding across the early years of childhood", Cambridge, MA, NBER Working Paper No. 16496, NEBR.
5. Blinder, A.S. (1973), "Wage discrimination. Reduced form and structural elements" in Journal of Human Resources, Vol. 8, No. 4, pp. 436-455.
6. Boehm, J., Lyubomirsky, S. (2008), "Does happiness promote career success?" in Journal of Career Assessment, Vol. 16, No. 1, pp. 101-116.
7. Bollinger, C.R., Hirsch, B.T. (2013), "Is earnings nonresponse ignorable?" in Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 95, No. 2, pp. 407-416.
8. Chen, G., Hamori, S. (2009), "Economic returns to schooling in urban China: OLS and the instrumental variables approach" in China Economic Review, Vol. 20, No. 2, pp. 143-152.
9. Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CAS) (2010), Chinese Urban Labor Survey Database 2010, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing.
10. Clark, A.E., Frijters, P., Shields, M.A. (2008), "Relative income, happiness and utility: an explanation for the Easterlin paradox and other puzzles" in Journal of Economic Literature, Vol. 46, No. 1, pp. 95-144.
11. Cropanzano, R., Wright, T.A. (2001), "When a 'happy' worker is really a 'productive' worker: a review and further refinement of the happy-productive worker thesis" in Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, Vol. 53, No. 3, pp. 182-199.
12. Cummins, R.A. (1998), "The second approximation to an international standard of life satisfaction" in Social Indicators Research, Vol. 43, No. 1, pp. 179-200.
13. Cummins, R.A. (2000), "Personal income and subjective wellbeing: a review" in Journal of Happiness Studies, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 133-158.
14. Davey, G., Rato, R. (2012), "Subjective wellbeing in China: a review" in Journal of Happiness Studies, Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 333-346.
15. Denny, K., Oppedisano, V. (2010), "Class size effects: evidence using a new estimation technique", Working Paper No. 2010/51, UCD Geary Institute, Dublin.
16. Diener, E., Nickerson, C., Lucas, R., Sandvik, E. (2002), "Dispositional affect and job outcomes" in Social Indicators Research, Vol. 59, No. 3, pp. 229-259.
17. Erdogan, B., Bauer, T., Truxillo, D., Mansfield, L. (2012), "Whistle while you work: a review of the life satisfaction literature" in Journal of Management, Vol. 38, No. 4, pp. 1038-1083.
18. Fama, E. (1980), "Agency problems and the theory of the firm" in Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 88, No. 2, pp. 288-307.
19. Fisher, C.D. (2003), "Why do lay people believe that satisfaction and performance are correlated? Possible sources of a commonsense theory" in Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 24, No. 6, pp. 753-777.
20. Flory, J.A., Leibbrandt, A., List, J. (2010), "Do competitive workplaces deter female workers? A large-scale natural experiment on gender differences in job-entry decisions", Cambridge, MA, NBER Working Paper No. 16546, NEBR.
21. Fredrickson, B.L. (2001), "The role of positive emotions in positive psychology: the broaden and build theory of positive emotions" in American Psychologist, Vol. 56, No. 3, pp. 218-226.
22. Gibbons, R., Murphy, K.J. (1992), "Optimal incentive contracts in the presence of career concerns: theory and evidence" in Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 100, No. 3, pp. 468-505.
23. Gneezy, U., Niederle, A., Rustichini, A. (2003), "Performance in competitive environments: gender differences" in Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 118, No. 3, pp. 1049-1073.
24. Graham, C., Eggers, A., Sukhtankar, S. (2004), "Does happiness pay? An exploration based on panel data from Russia" in Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Vol. 55, No. 3, pp. 319-342.
25. Groves, M.O. (2005), "How important is your personality? Labor market returns to personality for women in the US and UK" in Journal of Economic Psychology, Vol. 26, No. 6, pp. 827-841.
26. Gustafsson, B., Li, S. (2000), "Economic transformation and the gender earnings gap in urban China" in Journal of Population Economics, Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 305-329.
27. Hahn, J., Hausman, J. (2003), "Weak instruments: diagnosis and cures in empirical economics" in American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings, Vol. 93, No. 2, pp. 118-125.
28. Holmstrom, B. (1982), "Managerial incentive problems: a dynamic perspective" in Review of Economic Studies, Vol. 66, No. 1, pp. 169-183.
29. International Wellbeing Group (2006), Personal Well-being Index, Australian Centre on Quality of Life, Deakin University, Melbourne, 4th ed.
30. Kahneman, D., Krueger, A.B., Schkade, D., Schwarz, N., Stone, A.A. (2006), "Would you be happier if you were richer?" in Science, Vol. 312, No. 5782, pp. 1908-1910.
31. Kang, L., Peng, F. (2012), "Siblings, public facilities and education returns in China", MPRA Paper No. 38922.
32. Kelly, I.R., Dave, D.M., Sindelar, J.L., Gallo, W.T. (2011), "The impact of early occupational choice on health behaviors", Cambridge, MA, NBER Working Paper No. 16803, NEBR.
33. Krueger, A.B., Schkade, D.A. (2007), "The reliability of subjective well-being measures", Cambridge, MA, Working Paper No. 13027, National Bureau of Economic Research.
34. Landy, F.W. (1985), The Psychology of Work Behavior, Dorsey Press, Homewood, IL, 3rd ed.
35. Lewbel, A. (2012), "Using heteroscedasticity to identify and estimate mismeasured and endogenous regressor models" in Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 67-80.
36. Li, H. (2003), "Economic reform and returns to education in China" in Economics of Education Review, Vol. 22, No. 3, pp. 317-328.
37. Liu, E., Zhang, S. (2012), "A meta-analysis of the estimates of returns to schooling in China", unpublished paper, Department of Economics, University of Houston, Houston, TX.
38. Liu, H. (2009), "Human capital investments and gender earnings gap. Evidence from China's economic reforms", unpublished paper, Department of Economics, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
39. Lyubomirsky, S., King, L., Diener, E. (2005), "The benefits of frequent positive affect. Does happiness lead to success?" in Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 131, No. 6, pp. 803-855.
40. Marks, G.N., Fleming, N. (1999), "Influences and consequences of well-being among Australian young people: 1980-1995" in Social Indicators Research, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 301-323.
41. Mincer, J. (1974), Education, Experience and Earnings, Columbia University Press, New York, NY.
42. Mohanty, M.S. (2009a), "Effects of positive attitude on happiness and wage: evidence from the US data" in Journal of Economic Psychology, Vol. 30, No. 6, pp. 884-897.
43. Mohanty, M.S. (2009b), "Effects of positive attitude on earnings: evidence from the US longitudinal data" in Journal of Socio-Economics, Vol. 38, No. 2, pp. 357-371.
44. Mohanty, M.S., Ullah, A. (2012a), "Direct and indirect effect of happiness on wages: a simultaneous equations approach" in Journal of Socio-Economics, Vol. 41, No. 2, pp. 143-152.
45. Mohanty, M.S., Ullah, A. (2012b), "Why does growing up in an intact family during childhood lead to higher earnings during adulthood in the United States?" in American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 71, No. 3, pp. 662-695.
46. Mueller, G., Plug, E. (2006), "Estimating the effects of personality on male-female earnings" in Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Vol. 60, No. 1, pp. 3-22.
47. Niederle, M., Vesterlund, L. (2007), "Do women shy away from competition? Do men compete too much?" in Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 122, No. 3, pp. 1067-1101.
48. Nyhus, E., Pons, E. (2005), "The effects of personality on earnings" in Journal of Economic Psychology, Vol. 26, No. 3, pp. 363-384.
49. Nyhus, E., Pons, E. (2012), "Personality and the gender wage gap" in Applied Economics, Vol. 44, No. 1, pp. 105-118.
50. Oaxaca, R. (1973), "Male-female wage differentials in urban labor markets" in International Economic Review, Vol. 14, No. 3, pp. 693-709.
51. Oshagbemi, T. (1999), "Overall job satisfaction: How good are single versus multiple-item measures?" in Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 14, No. 5, pp. 388-403.
52. Pencavel, J. (1998), "Assortative mating by schooling and the work behavior of wives and husbands" in American Economic Review, Papers & Proceedings, Vol. 88, No. 2, pp. 326-329.
53. Pollard, G. (1996), "A comparison of measures of job satisfaction used in studies of social communicators" in Gazette, Vol. 57, No. 2, pp. 111-119.
54. Qian, X., Smyth, R. (2008), "Private returns to investment in education in China: an empirical study of urban China" in Post Communist Economies, Vol. 20, No. 4, pp. 483-501.
55. Regus (2011), Flexible Working Goes Global, Regus Consulting, Melbourne.
56. Ren, W., Miller, P. (2012), "Changes over time in the return to education in urban China: conventional and ORU estimates" in China Economic Review, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 154-169.
57. Sabia, J.J. (2007a), "Reading, writing and sex: the effect of losing virginity on academic performance" in Economic Inquiry, Vol. 45, No. 4, pp. 647-670.
58. Sabia, J.J. (2007b), "The effect of body weight on adolescent academic performance" in Southern Economic Journal, Vol. 73, No. 4, pp. 871-900.
59. Seligman, M.E.P., Steen, T.A., Park, N., Petersen, E. (2005), "Positive psychology progress: empirical validation of interventions" in American Psychologist, Vol. 60, No. 5, pp. 410-421.
60. Semykina, A., Linz, S.J. (2007), "Gender differences in personality and earnings: evidence from Russia" in Journal of Economic Psychology, Vol. 28, No. 3, pp. 387-410.
61. Small, D.A., Gelfand, M., Babcock, L., Gettman, H. (2007), "Who goes to the bargaining table? The influence of gender and framing on the initiation of negotiation" in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 93, No. 4, pp. 600-613.
62. Smyth, R., Nielsen, I., Zhai, Q. (2010), "Personal well-being in urban China" in Social Indicators Research, Vol. 95, No. 2, pp. 231-251.
63. State Statistical Bureau (2008a), China Statistical Yearbook, State Statistical Bureau, Beijing.
64. State Statistical Bureau (2008b), China City Statistical Yearbook, State Statistical Bureau, Beijing.
65. Tan, L., Jiang, Y. (2008), "Gender equality and women's development under the background of the construction of a harmonious society and the improvement of people's lives" in Tan, L. (Ed.), Report on Gender Inequality and Women's Development in China, Social Science Academic Press, Beijing, pp. 17-31.
66. Tsai, W.C., Chen, C.C., Liu, H.L. (2007), "Test of a model linking employee positive moods and task performance" in Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 92, No. 6, pp. 1570-1183.
67. Wanous, J.P., Reichers, A.E., Hudy, M.J. (1997), "Overall job satisfaction: how good are single item indicators?" in Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 82, No. 2, pp. 247-252.
68. Wright, T.A., Cropanzano, R. (2007), "The happy/productive worker thesis revisited" in Research in Personnel and Human Resource Management, Vol. 26, pp. 269-307, doi: 10.1016/S0742-7301(07)26006-2.
69. Zalenski, J.M., Murphy, S., Jenkins, D.A. (2008), "The happy-productive worker thesis revisited" in Journal of Happiness Studies, Vol. 9, No. 4, pp. 521-537.
70. Zhang, J., Han, J., Liu, P.W., Zhao, Y. (2007), "Trends in the gender earnings differential in urban China" in Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Vol. 61, No. 2, pp. 224-243.