Publications
Publications
- Forthcoming
- American Economic Review
The Old Boys' Club: Schmoozing and the Gender Gap
By: Zoë B. Cullen and Ricardo Perez-Truglia
Abstract
Offices are social places. Employees and managers take breaks together and talk about
family and hobbies. In this study, we show that employees’ social interactions with their managers
can be advantageous for their careers, and that this phenomenon contributes to the gender
pay gap. We use administrative and survey data from a large financial institution and exploit
quasi-random variation induced by the rotation of managers. We provide evidence that when
employees have more face-to-face interactions with their managers, they are promoted at a
higher rate. This mechanism could explain a third of the gender gap in promotions at this firm.
Keywords
Career; Promotions; Social Interactions; Networking; Interpersonal Communication; Familiarity; Equality and Inequality; Gender
Citation
Cullen, Zoë B., and Ricardo Perez-Truglia. "The Old Boys' Club: Schmoozing and the Gender Gap." American Economic Review (forthcoming).
Supplemental Information
Online Appendix