Differences between individuals, jobs and employers

A range of factors determine an employee’s hourly wage. Wage differences between men and women arise because men and women are affected by different factors. By taking these differences into account as much as possible in a statistical model, the wage gap is statistically adjusted. The characteristics that are taken into account are:

Employee characteristics: age, origin, level of education, field of study, number of years employed by current employer, career breaks, average parttime factor over the past fifteen years, region of residence, degree of urbanisation of the municipality of residence;

Employer characteristics: sector, number of people employed in the organisation;

Job characteristics: occupational level, field of expertise, fixed-term/permanent contract, full-time/part-time work, type of employment relationship, managerial position.

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