Gender-Based Wage and Occupational Inequality in the New Millenium in Egypt

This paper adds to the existing literature on the Egyptian labor market by examining the extent to which the treatment of women in the Egyptian private labor market has evolved, and if occupational segregation has affected gender wage gaps in the newly transformed Egyptian economy. The paper tracks the current trend of gender based wage gaps, and evaluates the role of occupational segregation in explaining these gaps in the Egyptian private labor market. Comparing the years 2000 and 2004, and arranging occupations in three broad categories, findings of this study point to a wider occupational segregation and increased crowding of women in few jobs, which are becoming a more serious issue in pay differences than pure pay discrimination for both professional and blue collar women. Pay discrimination for white collar workers is not as severe as in professional and blue collar jobs. Therefore, policies that target inter-occupational components to close the wage gap may have far-reaching effects on professional and blue-collar workers, whereas policies targeting equal pay for equal jobs will have a greater success for white-collar workers.