The Sexual Orientation Wage Gap for Racial Minorities

Abstract

We explore the sexual orientation wage gap across four race and ethnic groups in the 2000 U.S. Census: Asian, black, Hispanic, and white. Using decomposition analysis, we explore if racial minority groups experience the same pattern of sexual orientation wage differences as their white counterparts, and how racial and sexual orientation wage differences interact over the distribution of wages. For men, we show a combined unexplained penalty greater than the sum of their individual unexplained race and sexual‐orientation differentials. Racial minority lesbians, however, earn higher wages than what the sum of their racial and sexual‐orientation analyses would suggest.

Identity Management: Worker Independence and Discrimination Against Gay Men

“…A large literature has emerged in response to Badgett's () seminal investigation into the earnings effects of sexual orientation. This literature has produced the stylized fact that gay men earn less than their heterosexual counterparts in the United States (Baumle and Poston ; Berg and Lien ; Black et al ; Blandford ; Carpenter , ; Clain and Leppel ; Douglas and Steinberger ; Jepsen and Jepsen ; Klawitter ; Klawitter and Flatt ) and elsewhere (Ahmed and Hammarstedt ; Ahmed, Andersson, and Hammarstedt 2011, 2013a; Arabsheibani, Marin, and Wadsworth ; Carpenter ; Plug, Webbink, and Martin ). The earnings effects are meaningfully large, though estimates do span a wide range: the gay penalty has been as large as 30% (Klawitter ) .…”

Occupational Achievements of Same‐Sex Couples in the United States by Gender and Race

“…The logit estimation allows computing the decomposition of the change between the conditional and the unconditional analysis straightforwardly. Note that although we built a counterfactual economy in terms of DiNardo, Fortin, and Lemieux (1996), as in Douglas and Steinberger (2015), we do it in a different way. First, compared to their study, in which occupations are a characteristic of the groups, as is education, age, and so on, in this investigation, occupation is not a variable that we use to define the subgroups (cells) into which each of our sexual orientation-gender-race groups are divided.…”

“…Evidence exists that the racial composition of the gay and lesbian population plays a non‐negligible role in explaining these men and women’s occupational achievements and earnings (Del Río and Alonso‐Villar ). We also know that the magnitude of lesbians’ wage premiums and gay men’s wage penalties, compared with their heterosexual peers, vary across races/ethnicities (Douglas and Steinberger ). However, not much knowledge exists about the occupational achievements of gay men and lesbians of different races/ethnicities and how gender, race, and sexual orientation interplay to benefit some groups and harm others.…”

“… See Antecol, Jong, and Steinberger (2008),Douglas and Steinberger (2015), andSchneebaum and Badgett (2019).…”

If Queers were Counted: An Inquiry into European Socioeconomic Data on LGB(TI)QS

“…There is a growing international body of economic and social research indicating that sexuality/sexual orientation has a tremendous impact on socioeconomic status, labor market standing, and social cohesion for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer persons (LGB[TI]Qs) 1 ; Ahmed, Andersson, and Hammarstedt 2011;Tilcsik 2011;Botti and D'Ippoliti 2014;Douglas and Steinberger 2014;Drydakis 2014;Ozeren 2014;Plug, Webbink, and Martin 2014;Badgett and Schneebaum 2015;Klawitter 2015;Sabia 2015;Uhrig 2015). Policy-oriented research based on community surveys, as well as insights from within LGB(TI)Q and human rights organizations, supports this evidence (Equality and Human Rights Commission 2009; European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights [FRA] 2014;ILGA-Europe 2015).…”