Gender and perceived income entitlement among full-time workers: Analyses for Canadian national samples, 1984 and 1994

In 2 studies, gender differences in perceived income entitlement through th e use of survey data from 2 national samples of full-time workers interview ed in 1984 and 1994 were investigated. We examined whether, and how, views on income entitlement of women and men differ when they are asked about the ir earnings from real full-time jobs. As expected from the experimental lit erature, there are gender differences in perceived income entitlements befo re controls for work characteristics and social background characteristics for both samples and time periods; women felt deserving of less than men di d. These differences persist even after multivariate controls for the effec ts of education, age, time in the career, and 3 characteristics of the type of job on which income entitlement views are based. However, significant g ender differences in perceived income entitlement do not obtain with added controls for last year's income in the 1984 data. They are much reduced, bu t still significant in the 1994 data. Both women and men often felt that th ey deserve somewhat more than they actually earned. In 1984, there was no d ifference in the proportions of women and men who felt they deserved more i ncome than they earned, but in 1994 proportionally more women than men felt deserving of additional pay. The differences in results across the 2 studi es may be due either to changes over time or to small differences in the pr ocedures of the studies.