Analysis of gender wage inequality in the Spanish hospitality industry: based on a comparison of 2014 and 2018

Abstract

[eng] As a very inclusive economic sector, the hospitality industry has absorbed a large number of female employees. However, the gender wage gap in this industry still cannot be ignored. Thisstudyaims to probe into the changes in the gender wage gap within the overall industry distributionandchanges in elements causing the gender wage difference in the Spanish hospitality industryin2014and 2018. After analysis, we find that the salary level of the hospitality industry in 2014 and2018wasstill at the low end of the entire economic industry, but in 2018 the hospitality industry becamethesector with the smallest gender wage gap. In terms of low salary levels, the hospitality industry'ssalaryis the highest in the overall industry, and it performed better in 2014 than in 2018, but thegendersalary gap at this stage is relatively large. In terms of medium and high salary levels, the salarygapbetween men and women in the hospitality industry is controlled within the third smallest range, but the ranking in 2018 is even higher. However, its salary is lower than most other industries. Inaddition, the non-observable discriminatory factors in these two years caused a larger gender wagegapthanthe observable non-discriminatory factors, but the contribution of these two groups of variablestothegender wage gap in 2018 was smaller than in 2014. Deeply, occupation characteristics arethemainreason for widening the gender wage gap, and compared with 2014, this phenomenon has beenmoreclearly reflected in 2018, especially in high-salary level. The government is the main force toovercomethe gender wage gap, who should implement welfare subsidy policies and strengthen supervisiontoreduce the gender wage inequality in the industry. The hospitality industry itself also needs toset upan investigation team to regularly check men’s and women’s wage difference and takeactionstoadjust it.