Gender Differences in Wages and Training∗

Susanne Steffes† and Arne Jonas Warnke‡

December, 2016

Preliminary draft!

Abstract

There is an extensive literature on the gender wage gap and the reasons behind it. Some
studies have pointed out prevailing gender differences regarding the participation in job-
related training. In this study we shed new light on these gender differences in training, and
their effect on wages. Our central finding is that there is a substantial training gap between
male and female employees which can be explained neither by job segregation, firm or
worker characteristics, nor by unobserved productivity. We suggest that this result may
be explained by statistical discrimination, signaling or preferences. Nevertheless, gender
differences in training do not provide an explanation for the gender wage gap since there
are counterbalancing effects. On the one hand, female workers receive less firm-sponsored
training. But these courses do not have large training effects anyway. On the other hand,
women more often co-sponsor training themselves. Even though these courses lead to
higher wages, the returns for women appear to be smaller than those for male workers.

JEL Classification: I24, J16, J24, M53

Keywords: Human Capital, Training, Gender Wage Gap (GWG), Linked-Employer-Employee
Data (LEE), Blinder-Oaxaca Decomposition, Unobserved Heterogeneity

∗
Special thanks go to Uschi Backes-Gellner, Sarra Ben Yahmed, Daniel Dietz, Bernd Fitzenberger, Katja Gör-
litz, François Laisney, Heiko Stüber, Elsbeth Wright, Thomas Zwick and seminar participants at the 18th Collo-
quium on Personnel Economics, EEA Conference 2015, and at workshops at the Humboldt University, University
of Würzburg, ZEW Mannheim and of the DFG SPP1764. We are grateful to Alina Bartscher, Maximilian Hup-
pertz, Thies Wollesen and Steffen Wyngra for their outstanding research assistance.
†
ZEW Centre for European Economic Research Mannheim. E-mail: steffes@zew.de.
‡
ZEW Centre for European Economic Research Mannheim. E-mail: warnke@zew.de.
1 Introduction

There is a significant gender wage gap (GWG) in the labour market. In 2015 for example, the
raw gap in gross hourly wages earned by men and women in Germany, was 21% (Statistisches
Bundesamt, 2016). Many hypotheses have been developed and tested with the aim of explaining
such differences (for a recent review see Blau and Kahn, 2016). The relevant studies have often
focused on differences in human capital, in workers’ level of schooling, work experience and on
occupational segregation.1 Such gender differences remain, however, only partially explained.
Indeed, the GWG is noticeable even between women and men who have comparable levels of
education and who are employed in similar jobs. In Germany for example, around one third of
the GWG cannot be explained by observable differences such as working hours, managerial po-
sitions or sector (Statistisches Bundesamt, 2016). At the same time, a large body of theoretical
literature has highlighted the importance of investments in on-the-job (post-schooling) training
for wages and employment chances. If investments in training and the respective returns differ
between the sexes, it can be expected that this will contribute significantly to the gender dif-
ferences seen in the labour market. Detailed training information is, however, not available in
most datasets. Empirical literature on this topic is scarce, most existing studies do not consider
participation in training.
Previous research into on-the-job human capital investments made by male and female work-
ers has indeed indicated that investment behaviours differ between the sexes (Bassanini et al.,
2005). Several existing studies which have focused on Germany for example, have found lower
rates of participation in job-related training amongst women (Pischke, 2001; Fitzenberger and
Muehler, 2014). Having said this, male and female rates of participation in training do not
always differ to a significant extent (Leber and Müller, 2008; Grund and Martin, 2012). More-
over, these differences vary with age (Fitzenberger and Muehler, 2014). It is also crucial to
take the nature of the tasks which workers actually perform into account. When considering
firm and worker characteristics only, Steffes and Warnke (2016) find no difference in the train-
ing behaviour of male and female workers. After detailed job content is taken into account,
however, lower participation rates in job-related training are noted amongst female workers.
In this study, we analyse whether the gap between the sexes in terms of their investments in job-
related training, what we term the gender training gap (GTG), can help to explain the gender
wage gap (GWG). We show that there are considerable differences between the male and female
workforce in terms of their participation in different forms of training. Theoretical models show
that human capital investments can generally be expected to result in higher wages (Becker,
1
See, for example, Macpherson and Hirsch (1995), Fitzenberger and Kunze (2005) or Addison et al. (2014).
More recent studies have tended to focus on psychological attributes or non-cognitive skills which ”account for a
small to moderate portion of the gender pay gap” (Blau and Kahn, 2016).

1
1962). We analyse therefore whether not only participation in training, but also wage returns to
training differ between men and women. The aim of this study is to investigate both the drivers
of the GTG and the respective gap in wage returns to training. This information will then enable
us to analyse how these phenomena are related to the GWG.
The decision to invest in work-related training is generally made by either the firm or the worker
(or a joint decision is made by these two parties). In addition, job content is closely associated
with participation in training (Steffes and Warnke, 2016). A comprehensive study on the deter-
minants of such investments should therefore take the heterogeneity of firms, workers and jobs
into account. We perform a statistical decomposition of the GTG in order to investigate to what
extent firm, worker and job characteristics might explain the difference between the male and fe-
male workforces’ participation in training. For this purpose, we use linked employer-employee
data which contains detailed (retrospective) information about individuals’ recent training his-
tory. In addition, the data includes information relating to firm, worker and job characteristics.
This dataset provides us with almost all information pertaining to the possible drivers of training
participation and wage differences which have been identified in previous studies. Furthermore,
the available survey data has been merged with administrative records. This allows us to ob-
serve detailed employment biographies for each individual, as well as aggregate information
concerning a firm’s total workforce. Contributing to the literature, we provide an in-depth in-
vestigation of the firm’s role in determining the allocation of work-related training to male and
female workers. Finally, we suggest a novel approach to the estimation of wage returns to
training.
Recent studies have emphasised the importance of information about the initiative and financing
of training investments for the analysis of the GTG (e.g. Simpson and Stroh, 2002 for the US,
or Puhani and Sonderhof, 2011 for Germany). Differences in the initiative and sponsorship of
training provided to male and female employees can be mainly attributed to a firm’s monopsony
power or to discriminatory behaviours. We contribute to the literature by proposing a new
measure for participation in job-related training. We differentiate between training courses
initiated and fully sponsored by the firm - those which take place wholly within working hours;
and training courses initiated by the worker - those conducted at least partially outside of the
individual’s usual working hours.
Empirical evidence has shown that the GTG cannot be fully explained by factors in the work-
ing environment and by differences in labour market attachment between men and women (e.g.
Royalty, 1996). We therefore examine whether heterogeneity which is not captured by observ-
able differences might also play a role. The recent literature on gender differences in the labour
market, for example, highlights the role of heterogeneity amongst women. Mulligan and Ru-
binstein (2008) show that in the US highly educated and highly productive women are today
more attached to the labour market than less educated and less productive women. Empirical

2
evidence relating to the GWG in Germany shows that women in male-dominated jobs often find
themselves being positively selected compared to their male peers (Ludsteck, 2014). It has been
shown that participation in training positively correlates with initial education levels and other
sources of productivity (Bassanini et al., 2005). We therefore expect investments in training to
be higher amongst the group of highly productive workers. In Germany at least, female labour
attachment closely correlates with a worker’s initial level of education and productivity. This
also applies, though not to the same extent, to men.2 These distinct gender differences in labour
attachment between more and less productive workers can also be expected to result in training
differences between men and women within these groups. There are larger differences in the
labour attachment between the group of less productive workers and this might lead to a larger
GTG within this group (see also the related discussion in Blau and Kahn, 2016). We address
this question by investigating the GTG for different groups of workers.
The paper is structured as follows. In Section 2 we summarise the most important existing
theoretical and empirical work in this field. In Section 3, we introduce our data. In Section 4 we
show and discuss evidence for the drivers of the GTG and in Section 5, we make the respective
link to wage returns. Our conclusions are detailed in Section 6.

2 Literature

Economic theories point to a number of possible reasons for the differences in training par-
ticipation between the male and female workforces (for reviews see Altonji and Blank, 1999;
Azmat and Petrongolo, 2014). Many of the mechanisms identified within the relevant theories
are similar, if not identical, to those recognised as driving the GWG. Whilst some models focus
on differences between individuals or jobs (human capital theory and occupational segregation
for example), other models consider firms’ behaviour (e.g. statistical or taste-based discrimi-
nation) and the influence that an individual firm may exert over its workers (e.g. monopsony
power).
In human capital models, it is the lower labour market attachment of women which is found to
explain gender differences in further training. This is also the case for models concerning job
and occupational segregation, phenomena which are closely related to human capital theory.
In such models, women either self-select into low-wage positions in which career interruptions
are less costly (Polachek, 1981), or firms assign women to jobs which require a lower degree of
investment in on-the-job training, and which, at the same time, offer women fewer opportunities
2
According to the Eurostat "Labor Force Survey" database for example, the employment rate amongst individ-
uals holding a tertiary degree in Germany in 2015 was 91.3% for men and 86.4% for women (individuals aged
25-64). The employment rates amongst male and female workers who are less highly educated and who hold no
vocational qualification were 68.0% and 51.5% respectively.

3
for career advancement (Lazear and Rosen, 1990; Barron et al., 1993). The reason for this is
the lower degree of labour market attachment expected amongst the female workforce due to
anticipated career interruptions or women’s decision to work fewer hours. Empirical studies
have indeed shown that men and women tend to be employed in different working environments
and perform different tasks. Goldin (2014) argues that a significant part of the GWG can be put
down to the fact that in certain occupations, the returns to working overtime and/or the penalties
for interruptions in employment are large. There are also differences in the work content of men
and women employed in the same occupations. Black and Spitz-Oener (2010) examine the role
of technological change between and within occupations, as seen over the last few decades, in
narrowing the GWG. Simpson and Stroh (2002) show that occupational segregation has a direct
impact on the GTG. Using US data, Simpson and Stroh have found that one third of the positive
GTG (that is where women participate in training more than men) can be explained by gender
segregation across jobs.3
Aside from occupational segregation, labour market attachment also has a direct impact in pro-
moting investments in on-the-job training (Becker, 1964). This is not true only of current labour
attachment, but also applies for expected or future labour attachment. On average, women are
more engaged in home production than men. Women therefore exhibit a higher turnover and
tend to work fewer hours. A shorter amortization period for training investments is therefore a
probable explanation for the GTG. Royalty (1996) finds that 25% of the negative GTG (women
participate less in training than men) seen for formal, in-house training courses can be explained
by gender differences in turnover probabilities. This does not, however, give us the full picture.
The remaining GTG is still considerable.
Other studies consider family status and motherhood in order to explain the GTG (Huber and
Huemer, 2015). Using data for Germany, Fitzenberger and Muehler (2014) find a negative GTG
which is related to childbearing but concerns all women in the relevant age group. Drawing
on the personnel records of a single firm, they find age-specific gender differences in rates of
participation in training. The raw participation gap in formal employer-provided training is
greatest when male and female workers are aged 35. Puhani and Sonderhof (2011) analyse
the effects that an extension of maternity leave has had on prolonged career interruptions in
Germany. They have found that these regulatory changes have led to a decline in the number
of training courses which employers offer even for young women without children. These
findings are consistent with models of statistical discrimination. According to these models,
firms use sex as a proxy for the unknown, individual labour attachment. A firm thereby relies
on information concerning the behaviour of previous female employees in order to predict the
future labour market attachment of currently employed female workers (Phelps, 1972; Arrow,
1973).
3
Other studies also find that occupational segregation explains around one third of the GTG (Grönlund, 2011).

4
Assuming symmetric information, expected labour market attachment should have a similar ef-
fect in determining the investments in training made by both firms and workers. It is clear that
both parties must predict the individual worker’s future labour attachment on the basis of infor-
mation which is currently available. These predictions are noisy as the future labour attachment
is unknown. In the case of asymmetric information, predictions made by the employer are also
less reliable than those made by the individual (Altonji and Blank, 1999). Let us assume that
the true labour attachment of a female worker is greater than the predicted group average. In
this case, she is likely to be subject to underinvestment by the firm. We presume therefore
that she has an incentive to increase her own investments in order to enhance her productivity
level, and/or to signal her engagement and willingness to the firm (Bassanini et al., 2005).4 This
example shows that proxies for low labour attachment can, on the one hand, be negatively cor-
related with firm-sponsored training whilst, on the other hand, being positively correlated with
worker-sponsored training.
From a firm perspective, it is important to consider not only labour attachment in general, but
also the male and female labour supply to any one firm. The role of part-time work provides a
good example of this. Reductions in working hours generally serve as a proxy for lower labour
market attachment. Working with data from Switzerland, however, Backes-Gellner et al. (2014)
identify no, or only small differences in participation in employer-provided training between
women working full-time and women working part-time. Picchio and Van Ours (2016) find
that the same is true for the female workforce in the Netherlands. Backes-Gellner et al. (2014)
provide a model of statistical discrimination in which a woman’s choice to work only part-time
in a given firm, is only a noisy predictor of her future attachment to that same firm. This explains
why there are only minor differences in training provision between full- and part-time workers.
We provide here a further explanation for the difference in training investments seen between
full and part-time workers. Under labour market frictions such as search and mobility costs,
the current firm exerts monopsony power. This means that the firm can reap a higher share of
the expected payoffs and in addition, poaching is less likely (Acemoglu and Pischke, 1998).
Accordingly, a higher level of firm attachment serves as an incentive for firms to invest more in
the human capital of its current workers. It should also be noted that, in general, women show a
greater level of firm attachment than men because their labour supply to the firm is less elastic
(Hirsch et al., 2010).
We suggest here that part-time work can function as a proxy for a high level of firm attachment
(an argument which has also been made by Picchio and Van Ours, 2016). Part-time workers tend
to favour greater temporal and geographical flexibility, which in turn negatively impacts on their
employment prospects. Part-time work can therefore serve as a proxy for low labour market
4
It could of course be the case that female workers are credit constrained or discouraged to invest in training
because the anticipate discrimination by the firm.

5
attachment and for a high degree of firm attachment with opposing predictions for training
investments. Although it is not clear whether part-time workers generally participate less in
training than full-time workers, we expect to see distinct differences between participation rates
in firm-sponsored and worker-sponsored training between full- and part-time workers. The
labour supply to a single firm is considerably more important for participation in firm-sponsored
training courses because firms want to ensure that their training investments pay off.
The role of the firm in perpetuating differences in male and female investments in on-the-job
training has in general received little attention in the literature. Studies on wage inequalities
highlight the importance of firms in general, and in particular, the significance of sorting work-
ers into firms (Card et al., 2016; Card et al., 2016). In addition, differences in the capacity of
firms to exert monopsony power or taste-based discrimination may lead to differences between
firms in terms of the investments they make in on-the-job training (Blau and Kahn, 2016). While
it is empirically difficult to disentangle discriminatory behaviour from other mechanisms such
as monopsony power, linked employer-employee data can help us to understand the difference
across and within firms (Webber, 2016).
The wage returns workers gain on training investments depends on the allocation of costs as well
benefits. If the firm bears the majority of investment costs, for firm-specific training courses for
example, it will also most likely reap the benefits in form of higher productivity. The worker’s
share of benefits may be relatively low. This might explain why recent studies have found
low wage returns to training attendance. This implies that the wage effect will be greater for
worker-sponsored training.
The question remains, however, why the returns to training should differ between men and
women at all. Gender differences in returns to training have received far less attention than
differences in returns to schooling. On the one hand, one might argue that returns are lower for
female employees only if returns are the result of a negotiation process between the firm and its
workers. It has been shown that women tend to have less bargaining power than men (compare
Card et al., 2016). On the other hand, women’s participation in on-the-job training might be the
result of a process of positive selection, whereby participating women would be generally more
productive than male participants. This could mean that women will derive greater benefits
from participation in training than men (note the positive correlation between a high level of
skill/ability and returns to training).
Low wage returns to participation in training have recently been identified in the empirical
literature by, among others, Leuven and Oosterbeek (2008), Goerlitz (2011), Schwerdt et al.
(2012) and Görlitz and Tamm (2016).5 These studies do not, however, differentiate between
firm- and worker-sponsored training. Pischke (2001) finds higher returns to training which
5
Earlier studies have often found very high returns to training using instrumental variable approaches. More
recent studies, however, use comparison group approaches (see Section 5) or randomised voucher experiments.

6
is sponsored by workers, than on training funded by firms. This is particularly the case for
women.

3 Data

We use the German linked employer-employee dataset WeLL Berufliche Weiterbildung als Be-
standteil Lebenslangen Lernens (further training as a part of lifelong learning, see Huber and
Schmucker, 2012). This survey focuses on participation in training and comprises four waves,
conducted between 2007 and 2010. Data was collected by the Research Data Centre of the Fed-
eral Employment Agency at the Institute for Employment Research (FDZ). In the following,
we briefly describe the available dataset. We give a more detailed description about WeLL in
Steffes and Warnke (2016). WeLL consists of 149 establishments from both the manufactur-
ing and service sectors, for which information is available from the IAB Establishment panel
(an annual employer survey, see Kölling, 2000). These establishments have a workforce of
between 100 and 2000 employees. They operate in five German states, including two in East
Germany. An employee survey was conducted, consisting of more than 18,500 interviews with
7,350 respondents.6
WeLL contains comprehensive information on workers’ recent participation in training. The
questionnaire includes retrospective questions about individuals’ participation in formal training
courses. More specifically, questions concerned the duration and content of courses, as well
as the source of initiative for training, the source of finance and whether courses overlapped
with leisure time.7 In addition, the survey included questions regarding socio-demographic
characteristics, working time and reasons for cancelling training courses. Finally, respondents
were asked about their health, labour attachment and career aspirations.
Survey data in WeLL has been linked to the administrative records of each employee
(Schmucker et al., 2014). Records contain information on wages per day, the duration of em-
ployment and periods of unemployment dating back to the 1970’s (or to the early 1990’s for
individuals from the former GDR).8 This information is available, not only for participants in
the WeLL panel, but for all workers in a firm. This gives us information about the size of an
establishment, its average wage and the establishment-specific gender wage gap or turnover
rate. A particular advantage of the WeLL dataset is the availability of information about hours
worked. This enables us to compute hourly wages.
6
These numbers exclude individuals who did not agree to their survey data being linked to social security
records (see Warnke, 2016).
7
Detailed information is available for up to three training courses per wave.
8
Periods of employment which are not subject to social security, such as periods of self-employment or em-
ployment in the civil service are not observed.

7
In line with previous literature, such as Arulampalam et al. (2004), we restrict the sample to
workers aged between 25 and 54. Older workers are excluded because training rates drop
sharply as retirement approaches (Zwick, 2015). Our analyses focus on workers who are still
employed in the establishment included in the WeLL survey. This is because we lack infor-
mation such as the sector of establishments which do not participate in the IAB Establishment
Panel. In addition, we exclude apprentices and focus our analyses on individuals with German
citizenship only. We also exclude individuals for whom information on the relevant variables
in Table 1a or Table 1b is missing. In line with previous studies, we also restrict the sample to
employees who work at least 15 hours a week (Arulampalam et al., 2004).9 This leaves us with
a sample of 149 establishments and 9,905 individuals, including 3,511 women (35.4%).
Information on employees’ daily wages is drawn from social security data. In order to calculate
an hourly wage, we merge information about the daily wages of a given employee with infor-
mation regarding the agreed number of weekly working hours. Daily wages, as given in social
security data, are top-coded. We therefore impute wages above the social security threshold
using tobit regression, taking the uncertainty of the imputation procedure and possible het-
eroscedasticity over time, as well as between men and women, into account (see Appendix
A.4.2).
Table 1a or Table 1b shows descriptives for our sample. The mean hourly wage is 16.82 Euro
for men and 13.10 Euro for women. Accordingly, the GWG in hourly wages in our dataset is
22.1%, which is comparable to the average GWG for Germany.10

3.1 Training Definition

The main variable of interest is workers’ participation in formal training courses. In the first
wave for instance, individuals were asked whether they participated in any job-related seminars
or training courses since January 1, 2016. On average, 49.2% of all workers in a given wave
have participated in job-related training (this is comparable to figures from other data, e.g. the
Adult Education Survey).
Individuals who responded positively to the above question, were then asked on who’s initiative
they had participated in training. Respondents were given the option of selecting one of the five
following answers: "my own initiative", "by order of the firm/supervisor", "mostly upon advice
of my firm", "mandatory occupational training" and "mostly upon the advice of someone else".
They were further asked whether they had attended the training course fully or partially during
9
In addition, we discuss further analyses based on the sample of full-time workers only.
10
The Federal Statistical Office of Germany gives a raw GWG of 23% for 2006 (24% in West Germany, and 6%
in East Germany). This includes other age groups, part-time workers, apprentices and those in partial retirement,
but excludes the self-employed (Finke, 2011).

8
working hours, during their own leisure time or during holidays.11
In order to capture the interactive relationship between workers and firms, we identify which
party initiated participation in a training course, and who then bore the cost in terms of time.
As in the previous literature (e.g. Pischke, 2001), we do not consider monetary investment a
suitable indicator of which party made the training investment. This is because only 16% of
all training courses are at least partially funded by the worker. Instead, we consider whether a
worker participated in a training course completely during their working hours (60%) or dur-
ing their leisure time (40%, including workers who participated in training entirely outside of
working hours). Practitioners have told us that firms often pay for training courses, even if it
is not directly relevant for the tasks involved in a job itself. In exchange, they require workers
to attend such a course at the weekend or in the evening. The question of which party initiated
training is important as it enables us to see whether it was primarily the firm or the worker who
wanted the worker to engage in training. This distinction in turn allows us to observe whether
female workers participate more often in training which they themselves have initiated, and in
which they invest their own time.
42.5% of all courses considered in the survey (for which detailed information is available) were
undertaken on the initiative of an individual worker. 39.7% of courses, however, were attended
following orders or advice from the firm or a worker’s direct supervisor. 16.1% of courses
constitute mandatory job training. Only 1.6% are courses undertaken on the advice of a third
party, such as an employment agency. We have excluded both mandatory training, such as
obligatory first-aid training, and courses taken on the advice of a third party, from the analysis.
In addition, we do not consider training courses which workers participated in during periods
of unemployment.
We term a training course firm-sponsored if it is initiated by the firm and takes place completely
during working hours. The average participation rate in firm-sponsored training is 21.9% for
men and 18.6% for women. Worker-sponsored training are courses which are initiated by the
worker and take place at least partially in the worker’s leisure time. 10.5% of men and 19.8%
of women participate in training courses co-sponsored by the worker themselves. We do not
consider in the main part training courses which are initiated by the worker and which take place
completely in working hours (see Appendix 3.1). There are fewer training courses initiated by
the firm and overlapping with leisure time which we also disregard here.
11
Possible answers to this question were, "completely in working time", "only partly in working time", "com-
pletely outside working hours", "not employed at that time".

9
3.2 Control Variables

Our choice of variables was strongly influenced by close reading of the training and GWG
literature.
In all specifications, we control for the year of the survey to capture time effects. Given that the
time period about which workers are retrospectively asked differs between and within waves
we add a variable to each specification which captures the length of that time period in months.
In addition, we include an indicator for the worker’s gender. We subsequently add worker and
establishment information, characteristics of the employment relationship and of the job itself.
These later aide us in providing possible explanations for the GTG. We also include pre-survey
wage fixed-effects as a proxy for the unobserved productivity of a worker.
Worker characteristics include formal education, age, age squared and actual work experience
(since 1992). Establishment information covers the German Bundesland in which a firm is lo-
cated, the size of the firm (100-250, 250-500 or 500-2,000 employees) and the operating sector
(service or manufacturing sector). We add an indicator for public, as opposed to private enter-
prises, and also indicate whether the firm has an active works council. As in Steffes and Warnke
(2016), we also use the social security data of all employees of the given establishment, includ-
ing those employees who did not participate in the survey, to derive the median wage within an
establishment and the linear growth rate of the median wage from 2000 to 2010. We add a mea-
sure for the wage-compression of the establishment which, according to the model provided by
Acemoglu and Pischke (1999), might motivate firms to invest in general training. This measure
is the standard deviation of an establishment’s log daily wages for full-time workers in 2006.
For wage regressions, we also add further information regarding the presence of a collective
agreement (either sectoral or company agreement).12
In Steffes and Warnke (2016), we have shown that the employment relationship, as well as
the content of a job, play an important role in determining levels of participation in training.
The variation between firms, in terms of the average rates of participation in training of their
employees, can to a large extent be explained by differences in firms’ use of production tech-
nologies (measured according to occupations and job tasks). To ensure that differences in male
and female participation in training are not driven by divergent work conditions, we add a num-
ber of variables to our specifications. We include tenure at the current firm and indicate whether
a worker is employed on a temporary contract.13 We control for working time by including
12
For the training regressions, we only indicate whether there is a works council in a firm. This is due to the
limited number of establishments in our sample. Pfeifer (2015) finds that, in Germany, the presence of a works
council is a significant determinant of workers’ participation in training. This is not the case for a union.
13
Tenure is measured from 1992 onwards. Employment at a firm before 1992 cannot be taken into account
because no information is available for establishments located in East Germany before the German reunification
in 1990.

10
an indicator for part-time work which takes the value one if a worker has a working time of
between 15 and 34 hours a week.14 In addition, we add information relating to the job tasks
performed by a worker, as well as details about his or her occupation (see Appendix A.4.4).
It is important to note, that even a rich set of observable characteristics may not fully capture
all the heterogeneity between workers which is relevant for participation in training (see also
Steffes and Warnke, 2016). Recent studies which have considered returns on training partici-
pation, have therefore used voucher experiments (Schwerdt et al., 2012, or Görlitz and Tamm,
2016), a quasi-experimental framework. Other studies have compared the wage growth of em-
ployees who have participated in training with that of individuals who intended to attend train-
ing but did not, due to more or less random events (sometimes termed the ’comparison group’
approach e.g. Leuven and Oosterbeek, 2008, or Goerlitz, 2011). In the majority of analyses, we
will add a proxy for unobserved productivity (see next paragraph). The reason for this is that we
are specifically aiming to compare employees who have participated in training with all other
workers. Restricting the analyses to those workers who intended to participate in training may
provide misleading results if, for example, certain workers are discouraged from even trying to
attend training because they anticipate that their employer will not provide any. Furthermore,
due to the nature of the dataset, we do not know by whom a training course was initiated. Sim-
ilarly, our dataset does not indicate whether the training course which an employee intended to
attend, but did not, would have taken place during or outside of working hours. We will, how-
ever, use a comparison group approach in combination with a proxy for unobserved productivity
in order to analyse possible wage effects of training (see Section 5).
As a proxy variable for the unobserved productivity (see Wooldridge, 2002), we extract a
worker’s fixed effect from a log daily wage regression for the pre-survey period (2000-2006)
from social security data. We control for work experience, work experience squared, tenure
and job status (e.g. blue-collar or white-collar, master craftsmen, part-time worker). Further
details are given in the Appendix A.4.2. We are careful to acknowledge that this measure of
unobserved ”productivity” might also reflect any existing discrimination seen in pre-training
wage levels (we discuss this topic in Section 4.5).

4 Results for Training

4.1 Gender Differences in Training

Table 1a shows that female workers generally participate more than male workers in non-
mandatory job-related training. In a given wave, 50.8% of women, compared to only 48.3%
14
Results are similar if we use working time and working time squared.

11
of men, participate in training. Given the average training rate of 49.2%, the gender differ-
ence of 2.7pp is sizeable, although not statistically significant. The division of training courses
into those initiated by the firm and taking place during working hours (firm-sponsored), and
those initiated by the worker overlapping with leisure time (worker-sponsored) reveals an in-
teresting picture. Whilst men generally show a greater tendency than women to participate in
firm-sponsored training (22.1% compared to 18.2% for women), we find a positive and eco-
nomically large GTG in respect to worker-sponsored training (10.5% participation rate for men
compared to 19.9% for women). We limit the analyses here to the incidence in participation
in training. Results are, however, very similar if we consider the intensity of participation in
training (see Appendix A.4.3).
We estimate a linear probability model to investigate the impact of potential drivers of partici-
pation in training (Equation (1)).15 This enables us to account for the fact that there is variation
between female and male employees in terms of work experience and the jobs in which men
and women are employed. The following equation shows our full specification:

Trainingit = Tit τ + Xit β + Femalei δ + α̂i γ + it . (1)

T includes wave fixed-effects and a measure of the duration of the potential training period.
X covers worker and establishment information, as well as characteristics of the employment
relationship and the job, including working-time, tenure or job tasks performed by the employee
(see Tables 1a-1b). α̂ is the proxy variable to account for unobserved productivity differences
(see Appendix A.4.2). δ measures our main parameter of interest - the respective GTG. We
label the GTG ”positive” if female workers exhibit higher rates of participation in training than
male workers, and ”negative” if not. The outcome in this regression is either participation in
work-related training (excluding mandatory training), in firm-sponsored, or worker-sponsored
training. In Figure 1, we illustrate the sensitivity of the GTG (the female coefficients δ) to
different sets of controls for each training outcome respectively.16 The first bar depicts the raw
differences (adjusted only for time effects), to which firm and worker characteristics have been
added to the regression shown in the second bar. The third bar illustrates results for a model
which also includes job characteristics. Finally, the fourth bar depicts the full model including
the proxy for unobserved productivity.17
Our results indicate a raw overall difference in job-related training between men and women that
15
Results are similar if for example, we use the logit link function and estimate Equation (1) via maximum-
likelihood. We cluster standard error on the establishment-level. For the specifications for which we add a proxy
for unobserved productivity, we bootstrap clustered standard error to account for the fact that this variable is
estimated with uncertainty, see Appendix.
16
Full results for Equation (1) including all controls, are provided in Table 2.
17
The minor difference between 2.7pp calculated from Table 1a and 2.6pp in Table 2 is a result of the inclusion
of time controls.

12
is not statistically significant (p-value 0.25). Depending on firm, worker and job characteristics,
the GTG becomes significantly negative (p-value 0.025). It would seem that women generally
participate slightly more in training. There are various potential reasons for this, including the
fact that women are often employed in jobs which require a high degree of training. If we take
selection into certain firms and jobs into account, and control for individual characteristics, we
see a significant decrease in female participation in training (-3.2pp). We hereby compare men
and women who are considered to share certain characteristics. The fact that the GTG reduces
to -2.1pp in the full model suggests that the GTG can in part be explained by the fact that male
workers have on average higher unobserved productivity than female workers.
In the second and third segments in Figure 1, we distinguish between firm- and worker-
sponsored training. For firm-sponsored training, we see that the firms in our sample provide
less training to female workers than they do to male workers. The first bar in the second seg-
ment shows a negative GTG of -3.9pp which is highly significant. The gap is almost halved
(in the full model) where we have added covariates to the model. This indicates that the GTG
can, to some extent, be explained by firm segregation and by the fact that men tend to work
more hours than women. We find a very large positive GTG for worker-sponsored training. The
difference between male and female participation in worker-sponsored training, of 9.4pp, as
shown in the third segment of Figure 1, indicates that female workers participate almost twice
as often as male workers in worker-sponsored training. The subsequent bars show that the GTG
in firm- and worker-sponsored training remains significant after conditioning for various firm,
worker and job characteristics. Having said this, observable differences do explain the training
differences between men and women to some extent (+2.4pp in the third bar in segment three).
If we finally add the proxy for unobserved productivity to the model, we see that the GTG once
again widens. This gives us a highly significant positive GTG for worker-sponsored training of
3.3pp. This indicates that the positive gap is partially driven by the fact that highly productive
female workers are more engaged in worker-sponsored training than their male counterparts.

4.2 The role of job characteristics

In order to gain a greater understanding of the significance of the various explanations for the
GTG posited above, we run a detailed Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition (for an overview, see
Fortin et al., 2011). An Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition partitions the difference in the average
training rate of men and women into a first part, which is explained by the predictors, and
a second part, which remains unexplained. The explained part draws on differences in the
characteristics X, the fact that women work part-time or tend on average to have less work
experience than men, for example. An unexplained part might arise if male part-time workers
were to be provided with more firm-sponsored training than female part-time workers. This
is due to differences in β̂ (including the intercept). In addition, the conditional GTG, which

13
remains after controlling for the full set of variables, is also included in the unexplained part. A
detailed decomposition gives us an individual contribution for each variable:

M F


M F
T ∗ M 0 M ∗

F 0 ∗ F
Train − Train = X − X β̂ + (X ) β̂ − β̂ + (X ) β̂ − β̂ . (2)
| {z } | {z }
Explained Part Unexplained Part

We now consider the decomposition of firm- and worker-sponsored training. As a reference,

we choose a pooled regression in which the regression coefficients are constrained to be equal
for both groups. Results for the two different kinds of training and different sets of variables are
depicted in Table 3. The coefficient in an unconditional regression of participation in training
for the variable of being female constitutes the ”raw gap” which is the same as that seen in
Figure 1 in column (1) (except for the presence of time controls). For firm-sponsored training,
we see that including various control variables or proxies for unobserved productivity reduces
the GTG by almost half (45%).
Table 3 shows that occupational segregation is the most important driver of the GTG seen for
worker-sponsored training (explaining 40% of the total difference). This is not the case, how-
ever, for firm-sponsored training (explaining only 3% of the total difference). Contrary to hu-
man capital theories, it would seem that firms do not base their training investment decisions
on the basis of their employees’ occupational background. A closer look reveals that female
workers are overrepresented in healthcare professions, including doctors and nurses (72.8% are
female), and in social and teaching professions (66.2%). As shown in Table 2, participation in
worker-sponsored training is very common in these occupations. In fact, no other jobs in our
sample exhibit higher training rates. Moreover, the fact of being employed in a healthcare or so-
cial profession is by far the most important predictor of participation in worker-sponsored train-
ing.18 In contrast, for firm-sponsored training healthcare, social and teaching professions, along
with organisational occupations (qualified office employees, accountants or entrepreneurs) and
other services (mostly low-skilled jobs such as cleaners or janitors) are those which also exhibit
the lowest participation rates.
Closer investigation of the role of job content within given occupations gives us a somewhat
different picture. In this case, the job characteristics generally attributed to female workers are
more favourable for both firm- and worker-sponsored training. The inclusion of job content
variables explains almost 12% of the total GTG for worker-sponsored training and 36% of the
GTG for firm-sponsored training. This means that the GTG in firm-sponsored training would
be approximately one third greater if women were to perform the same job tasks as men. Note,
that the fact that women perform job-tasks which require much training contradicts theoretical
models such as Barron et al. (1993). In this model it is predicted that firms will assign women
18
In these jobs, it is common that training is financed by the worker (or takes place outside working hours).

14
to jobs requiring less training in view of their lower degree of labour attachment. Women have,
however, recently benefited from technological changes which have been one driver of the nar-
rowing of the GWG over time (Black and Spitz-Oener, 2010). Indeed, we find that women work
with computers more often than men, they less often perform routine tasks such as operating
and monitoring machines, and are more likely to complete non-routine tasks such as organisa-
tional tasks, planning or gathering information (see Table 1a). The comparative advantage of
women in performing certain tasks which are in high demand in firms is a significant driver of
the narrowing of gender inequalities in the labour market (see Blau and Kahn, 2016).
Another job task which is not yet captured by the set of job content variables is leadership
responsibility. Our measure of leadership position covers superiors but also individuals who
regularly lead groups or projects. In our sample, 19% of female workers are in such positions
while this is the case for almost 36% of men. Since leadership positions are positively correlated
with participation in firm-sponsored training, this single variable accounts for 15% of the total
GTG for firm-sponsored training but only for 2% of the gap in worker-sponsored training. In
contrast to the results seen for job content, these results are in line with the model of Lazear
and Rosen (1990). Managerial jobs are often extremely time-consuming, leaving the individual
worker with less flexibility in his or her working schedule (Goldin, 2014). This might explain
why women are less likely to be employed in such positions.
Part-time work can be considered to be at the opposite end of the spectrum; working part-
time often serves as a job amenity providing individual flexibility (Goldin, 2014; Picchio
and Van Ours, 2016).19 The part-time workers in our sample are overwhelmingly female
(90.5%). These workers tend to participate significantly less often than full-time workers in
firm-sponsored training (-2.9pp, p-value 0.06). According to Table 3, part-time work explains
36% of the total GTG for firm-sponsored training. Undertaking part-time work is therefore
twice as significant as employment in a managerial position in determining participation in
training.20 As discussed in Section 2, part-time work can on the one hand serve as an indicator
for a high level of labour attachment. On the other hand, part-time work might also be viewed
as a proxy for (high) firm attachment because the labour supply of part-time workers to the local
firm is less elastic than it is for full-time workers. In the latter case, we would observe a positive
correlation between part-time work and participation in firm-sponsored training. Given that this
is not the case, we are able to conclude that the dominant effect is that part-time work does not
signal a high degree of attachment to the firm in which a worker is currently employed.
19
Note that we assume here that part-time work is voluntary.
20
If we look at full-time workers only (55.9% of females and 97.5% of males), we see that the GTG for firm-
sponsored, as well as for worker-sponsored training, is slightly reduced, but of similar magnitude as before. Full-
time employed females participate in firm-sponsored training by -1.7pp less (full controls; p-value 0.17). For
worker-sponsored training, we find a significant positive GTG of +2.5pp (p-value≈ 0.03) for the full-time sample.
The lack of statistical significance for firm-sponsored training is most probably due to the lesser number of female
workers left in the sample.

15
We can thus reasonably conclude that part-time work is viewed as a signal of lower labour
attachment or of a greater preference for non-market activities. It is not clear, however, whether
there are information asymmetries between the worker and the firm in regard to the worker’s
future labour attachment. In a market with symmetric information, we would expect that part-
time work would impact firm- and worker-sponsored training in a similar way. This is because
both parties would expect lower returns to training because of the current lower degree of labour
attachment. This is not necessarily the case, however, if a worker has superior information
about his or her own future labour attachment. Our results show a positive impact on worker-
sponsored training (+1.8pp, p-value 0.18) although part-time work explains only 6% of the total
gap. The diverging findings regarding the role of part-time work for participation in either firm-
or worker-sponsored training indicates that statistical discrimination by the firm plays a role.
But how can we explain the higher participation rates of part-time workers in worker-sponsored
training? A female part-time worker who exhibits an above average level of labour market
attachment has an incentive to compensate for the low investments made by the firm in her
training, by herself making investments. The female worker may, on the one hand, invest in
training in order to enhance her productivity in line with human capital theory. On the other
hand, she may consider her participation in training to function as a signal of her commitment
to the firm itself. We are unable to distinguish between these two mechanisms here. In either
case, an investment in training made by the worker, can induce the firm to reassess its prediction
of the individual’s future productivity and labour attachment.
It is clear that job characteristics are overall an important driver of the GTG, in particular for
worker-sponsored training. Job-characteristics explain around 10% of the total GTG for firm-
sponsored training and almost 60% of the GTG for worker-sponsored training (Table 3 ). The
impact of job tasks on the GTG for firm-sponsored training, is more than offset by the lesser
provision of training to part-time workers and by the under-representation of females in man-
agerial positions. Together, these factors lead to a negative contribution of job characteristics for
firm-sponsored training. Job heterogeneity makes a significant contribution to the positive GTG
seen for work-sponsored training. This is primarily due to occupational segregation, although
job tasks, and to a lesser extent part-time work, also play a role.

4.3 Content of training courses

We have seen that job characteristics are an important driver of the GTG and women have com-
parative advantages over men because they tend to perform job tasks which require a high level
of training. This raises the question whether we would find similar gender differences if we
were to consider the content of training courses themselves (Table 4). Our data enables us to
distinguish between courses primarily focusing on ICT skills, foreign language skills, commer-
cial or quality management, social, managerial, and health/safety content. Looking at Table

16
4, we see that after taking firm, worker and job characteristics into account, there are no firm-
sponsored training courses in which female workers participate significantly more often than
men.21 Men participate much more often than women in technical training courses sponsored
by the firm (+2.2 pp with an average training rate of 4.5%; p-value< 0.01). Overall, few work-
ers participate in firm-sponsored managerial training courses although women do tend to be
provided with fewer opportunities for leadership training (controlled for personnel responsibil-
ities and all other variables; -0.6pp, p-value 0.16). Men are therefore more often assigned to
training courses which we can expect to have greater returns to worker productivity, and which
in turn, increase the individual employee’s likelihood of promotion. Table 4 shows that even
within the same job, men participate more in certain forms of training than women. Conversely
however, there are no types of training in which men participate less often than women. It is
therefore interesting to analyse the differences between male and female workers in terms of
the returns to training and the role attributed to the content of training (see Section 5).
We observe some further differences between male and female workers in terms of the content
of the worker-sponsored training courses in which they tend to participate. Women show a ten-
dency to invest significantly more than men in courses focused on foreign language skills, and
somewhat more in ICT training (p-value< 0.01). The differences in participation in technical
training are rather small (-0.3pp n.s.). Particularly interesting, however, is the fact that females
participate significantly less than men in worker-sponsored training concentrating on leadership
skills. The magnitude of the difference between men and women is similar to that which we
see for firm-sponsored training (-0.8pp, p-value< 0.01, 0.7% of workers participate on average
in self-sponsored leadership courses). This might be considered to indicate one of two things.
Firstly, we might perceive that women do not seek such time-consuming positions, either be-
cause they prefer flexibility or because of the large anticipated penalties for lack of flexibility
in such positions (Goldin, 2014). Alternatively, it might indicate that women anticipate double
standards, whereby male workers would be favoured for promotion (Lazear and Rosen, 1990).

4.4 Sorting into firms

The Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition presented in Table 3 shows that firm characteristics are an
important driver of the GTG for firm-sponsored training. The gender-specific sorting of workers
into firms seems to be the source of around one third of the gender differences identified in
employers’ provision of training to male and female workers. This applies for worker-sponsored
training to a much lesser extent (explaining only 6% of the total difference).
According to Table 2, public enterprises sponsor less training than private firms (depending
21
Here, we estimate Equation (1) and regress, for example, participation in ICT training on firm, worker and job
characteristics including the proxy for unobserved productivity. Std. errors are bootstrapped.

17
on worker and job characteristics). It is important to note, therefore, that female workers are
overrepresented in these firms (compare Table 1b).22 In addition, women are underrepresented
in fast-growing businesses (according to the median wage trend) which tend to sponsor more
training. If we control for other firm and job characteristics, like Lynch and Black (1998), we
do not find any differences pertaining to firm size.
In order to gain a more thorough understanding of the impact of gender sorting on the GTG, we
investigate whether female workers are overrepresented in certain firms which generally provide
less training. If this were the case, controlling for differences in average rates of participation
in training would cause the GTG to vanish or at least to significantly diminish. We therefore
run a training regression (Equation (1)) with firm fixed-effects. Given that they are almost
all time-invariant, we also exclude all establishment characteristics. This means that we have
taken firm-segregation, and all policies which affect both sexes equally, into account. The
GTG in firm-sponsored training falls to -1.4pp, constituting a reduction of one third on Figure
1 column 4. Although the gap is now statistically insignificant, it is still large in magnitude.
The coefficient is reduced by only 16% in regard to worker-sponsored training. Within firms
therefore, female workers still tend to participate 2.6pp more often than men in self-sponsored
training. This difference is significant (p-value< 0.01). Whilst this exercise has indicated that
firm heterogeneity plays a role for the GTG, differences within firms still remain.

4.5 The role of worker characteristics

We have so far learned that firms systematically provide more training to men, whilst women
invest significantly more in training themselves. Since this phenomenon cannot be fully ex-
plained by job differences and firm sorting, we must now consider the role played by worker
characteristics in increasing the GTG. Human capital theory predicts that individual characteris-
tics play an important role for participation in job-related training. These characteristics include
education, age, work experience and productivity. Our results, presented in Table 2, generally
confirm these predictions. It is interesting, however, that we do not find an overall training ad-
vantage for highly educated workers. Individuals who hold a tertiary degree, for example, tend
to participate significantly less in firm-sponsored training than individuals who have had only
a vocational education (-3pp, p-value 0.02). The former are much more likely to participate in
22
This might seem surprising as the literature has frequently found that public-sector workers participate more
often than private sector workers in training. Indeed, in Steffes and Warnke (2016), we identified higher rates of
training in public enterprises. This can be primarily attributed to the occupational structure and the tasks usually
performed in these firms (Table 10 in Steffes and Warnke, 2016). This training often overlaps, however, with
leisure time (Tables 8 and 9 in the same paper). Although we did not specifically consider the initiative for training
in Steffes and Warnke (2016), we did not find any differences for training in working hours between public and
private sector workers when taking into account the fact that most public sector workers are employed in the service
sector.

18
worker-sponsored training (+4.4pp, p-value< 0.01).23 In line with human capital theory, age
and work experience are negatively correlated with training and the proxy for unobserved pro-
ductivity exhibits positive coefficients. The latter relationship is not significant, however, in the
regression concerning firm-sponsored training.
Female workers in our sample are somewhat more likely than male workers to hold a vocational
qualification (76.5% vs. 74.3%) and they are less likely to hold a tertiary degree (21.6% vs
24.6%, Table 1a). They have on average 3 years less work experience than men (which is
capped at 20 years, Table 1b). These characteristics favour female participation in training,
explaining 10% of the GTG seen for firm-sponsored training, and 14% of the GTG for worker-
sponsored training (Table 3). The positive impact of these characteristics in increasing female
participation in training, however, is offset by the negative impact of the proxy for unobserved
productivity. The fact that the average level of this fixed effect for women is half a standard
deviation lower than the average seen for men, explains around 10% of the GTG for both types
of training.
The last finding is somewhat puzzling. We find more women employed in jobs requiring a high
level of training and female workers exhibit characteristics which are associated with greater
participation in training. According to levels of pre-survey fixed effects, however, women can
be expected to be less productive than men. We are convinced that permanent wage components,
net of education, work experience, tenure and job status (see Appendix A.4.2), are some of the
best available measures of productivity.24 These measures are not, however, without limitations.
The measures are noisy, we do not have information about working hours in the social security
data which we utilize to extract the fixed-effects (only information about part-time work). An-
other explanation for the lower productivity is that additional job differences exist between men
and women which we do not capture by considering factors such as occupations and job tasks.
This job heterogeneity is reflected in a wage gap and, therefore, also in the differences in fixed
effects between men and women (as in Goldin, 2014).
Another more troublesome explanation is the GWG itself. Female wages are systematically
lower than those of their male counterparts, even within narrowly defined job cells and within
the same firms. If the GWG is in part a result of gender discrimination, this would also be
reflected in the differences in fixed effects (for example through in discriminatory wage policies,
see Blau and Kahn, 2016). If this is true, it would be expressed in our results in lower wages and
simultaneously, in lower human capital investments. But how then do we explain that results are
similar for firm- and worker-sponsored training? And why should firms behave like this? Under
23
In Steffes and Warnke (2016), we found that if we control for job characteristics, tertiary-educated workers in
fact participate slightly more in training which takes place at least partially during workers’ leisure time. There are
virtually no differences, however, for training undertaken during working hours.
24
Results are very similar if we use a random coefficient model in which we allow for individual heterogeneity
not only with regard to the intercept but also for the linear and quadratic slope coefficient of wages.

19
the assumption of perfect labour markets, discriminatory firms forego profits because they have
to pay higher wages (Becker, 2010)? We have no convincing answers to these questions.
In order to gain a more detailed picture of the situation described above, we next consider
whether the GTG in firm- and worker-sponsored training differs between groups of more or
less productive workers. According to the considerations outlined in Section 2, we can expect
a lower GTG among highly productive workers as there should be less differences in labour at-
tachment between men and women. According to statistical discrimination models, this should
be more relevant for firm-sponsored training. To examine this hypothesis, we look at three prox-
ies for productivity. Firstly, whether a worker holds a tertiary degree.25 Secondly, whether a
worker performs complex job tasks.26 . Finally, we consider whether a worker exhibits an above
average fixed effect. We split our sample according to the three group criteria and run separate
regressions by subgroup for both training outcomes on the full set of variables.
Overall, we find large differences in the GTGs of the various subgroups. The GTG in firm-
sponsored training is driven by differences in training participation amongst less productive men
and women. Amongst the group of non-university educated workers, female participation rates
are on average 3.5pp lower than those of male workers. We find a similar gap when considering
workers who perform routine or manual tasks and for those with below-average unobserved
productivity. In contrast, there are no significant differences between men and women within
the "highly productive" subgroups. Participation in firm-sponsored training tends to be even
higher amongst tertiary educated women than it is amongst their male counterparts (+0.7 pp,
albeit not statistically significant).
In contrast, ”highly productive” women participate more in worker-sponsored training than
"highly productive" men. Tertiary educated women for instance, participate in worker-
sponsored training on average 7.3pp more than their male counterparts (p-value< 0.01). The
gap still totals +3.9pp for workers who perform complex job tasks. And for workers who ex-
hibit above-average levels of productivity, we find a GTG of +5.9pp. Within the subgroup of
less productive workers, we find slightly higher rates of female worker-sponsored training for
the group of non-tertiary educated workers (+1.8pp, n.s.) and virtually no gender differences
within the other two subgroups.
In the Appendix A.3.1, we show that the GTG is not driven by the presence of children. Mothers
of children up to the age of 10 exhibit very low participation rates in training (firm- or worker-
sponsored), but we still document a negative GTG of 1.9pp for firm-sponsored training for
female workers without children (see Table 5; Fitzenberger and Muehler, 2014, find similar
25
There are only few low-skilled workers in our sample (1.4%). The majority of individuals who did not obtain
a tertiary degree hold a vocational qualification
26
Complex tasks are here defined as analytical tasks such as gathering information, investigating or researching
(see Black and Spitz-Oener, 2010). We find similar results if we look at complex interactive tasks.

20
results). The GTG in worker-sponsored is also not explained through motherhood. Furthermore,
the GTG cannot be explained by differences in average (firm-specific) turnover rates between
female and male workers (see also Royalty, 1996). Although women show higher turnover
probabilities, in particular in their thirties, this does not explain why firms provide less training
to them (see Appendix A.3.2).
To sum up, firms are more reluctant to invest in training for less productive women, than they
are for men with similar skills. In contrast, women who are more productive tend to invest more
often in training themselves, than do their male peers. The first finding suggests that discrim-
ination (whether statistical or taste-based remains unclear) does indeed continue to play a role
in perpetuating the GTG. How, however, do we explain the results for highly productive work-
ers? Firstly, regardless of their productivity levels, all women might expect to be (statistically)
discriminated against. Highly productive women might accordingly react by investing in train-
ing themselves. Secondly, women with particular career aims might face double standards for
promotions. They might therefore deem it necessary to make a greater self-investment, thereby
signalling their willingness and qualification level (as suggested in the model of Lazear and
Rosen, 1990). Finally, some female workers might later recoup foregone investments which
were earlier missed due to career interruptions or periods of working reduced hours. If firms
do not provide such training courses, more productive women might have an incentive to make
investments themselves in order to equalise human capital differences.

5 Results for Wages

The previous section has shown that in comparison to their male counterparts, female workers
participate less often in firm-sponsored training, and more often in worker-sponsored training.
If participation in training is associated with higher wages, we can expect opposing effects on
the GWG. Wage returns to training might, however, be close to zero if it is the firm rather than
the individual who reaps the majority of benefits from employees’ participation in training.
Furthermore, the wage effects of participation in training might differ between both firm- and
worker-sponsored training and between male and female workers. In this section, in order to
gain a clearer picture of these potential differences, we consider the wage returns for male and
female workers on the two different types of training considered. This in turn allows us to
analyse the overall effect of the GTG on the GWG.
We estimate a log-linear model via ordinary least squares in which we regress log hourly wages
on participation in training, interacted with an indicator for being female, and on control vari-

21
ables. We again distinguish between firm- and worker-sponsored training.

Log(Hourly Wage)it = Tit τ + Xit β + α̂i γ + Femalei δ (3)

+ Trainingi,t−1 γ + Trainingi,t−1 × Femalei η + it

We consider the hourly wages of individual i at time t. As in the previous section, we control
for time effects (T ) and unobserved productivity α̂. X includes the same list of firm, worker
and job characteristics as in Equation (1).27 Trainingi,t−1 indicates training courses which were
attended by individual i in the 12-24 month period (depending on the wave and on prior survey
participation) prior to the interview at point t. To measure wage returns to training, we look at
γ and η. γ measures the returns to training for male workers while η gives the corresponding
difference in wage returns to training for female workers. We limit the analysis to workers who
participated in one type of training and exclude individuals who participated in both types of
training during the observation period.
In order to establish a credible quasi-causal link between training and wages, we apply a so-
called comparison-group-approach (Leuven and Oosterbeek, 2008). We compare those who
participated in training, to those who intended to attend training but did not due to more or
less random events. This approach has been applied for the WeLL data by Goerlitz (2011).28
Goerlitz (2011) analyses wage returns to training without differentiating between firm-financed
or worker-financed training or between men and women. Using this approach, she finds small
positive but insignificant wage returns of about 0.5% for participation in one training course.
Random events includes training courses which were cancelled by the provider, and those which
had to be cancelled by the worker due to a high workload.29 Results based on the full sample of
workers are generally similar.
The results are presented in Table 6 in columns 3 and 4. If we look at the control variables
in our wage regression, we see that results for individual characteristics are in line with other
studies. We find higher wages for individuals who hold a tertiary degree and for male workers.
The age-profile of wages is inversely U-shaped, and increasing with experience. Establishment
characteristics do not seem greatly significant. This is most probably due to the small sample
size (n=149) and the sample selection criteria (firms between 100 and 2,000 employees). Whilst
some job-tasks are moderately related to wages, we find large differences between occupational
groups.
Table 6 further illustrates that wage returns to firm-sponsored training are small and close to zero
27
Additionally, we add information about unionization which we did not include in Equation (1), see Footnote
12.
28
Dietz and Zwick (2016) use this approach to measure the retention effects of training.
29
Goerlitz (2011) used the first wave of WeLL and also considered cancellation of attendance due to family or
health reasons. We choose not to include these reasons as they are not available in subsequent waves of WeLL.

22
(1.1% for men, column 3). Female workers seem to benefit more than men from participation in
firm-sponsored training but the difference compared to their male peers is insignificant (p-value
0.35). There are contrasting results for worker-sponsored training (column 4). We observe
significant and high wage returns for worker-sponsored training to the order of 4.2% for male
workers. Wage returns are lower for female workers (2.7%).30 The gender gap seen in wage
returns for worker-sponsored training is again not significantly different (p-value 0.57). We find
similar results for the whole sample (see columns 1 and 2).
The low wage returns for firm-sponsored training can be explained by the seminal model of
human capital theory (Becker, 1964). If training provided by the firm were purely firm-specific,
the firm would bear the total costs and reap the full benefits. We would thus not observe wage
returns to training.31 There are, however, two considerations which contradict this argument.
Firstly, the majority of training courses are rather general (Steffes and Warnke, 2016). Secondly,
workers may leave the firm which provided training if they do not see an increase in wages.
What then might explain the low returns to firm-sponsored training? Monopsony power of the
firms could limit poaching (Dietz and Zwick, 2016). Such market power might develop if out-
side firms have less information on the real productivity of a worker than the training firm. In
addition, we also see that most of the observed training courses are rather short (the median
number of hours per firm-sponsored training course is 16). To expect a direct effect on wages
might therefore be somewhat unrealistic, at least in the short-run. Having said that, there might
be medium- to long-run career effects which we cannot observe using a short observation pe-
riod. Beyond that, training might have other payoffs. According to Leuven et al. (2005) for
instance, training might be used by the firm to induce the reciprocity of the worker. Where a
firm invests in training, this may increase the worker’s positive opinion of the firm and he or she
may, in turn, effectively reward the firm with lower turnover intention or more effort. In addi-
tion, training might serve as employment insurance for some workers for whom productivity is
expected to drop below a certain threshold level. In such a case we would expect an impact on
layoffs but not on wages (at least no wage increases).
The large wage returns to worker-sponsored training of 3%-4% might seem surprising. There
are several arguments, however, that support this observation. Firstly, worker-sponsored train-
ing courses tend in general to be longer than firm-sponsored courses; the median number of
hours is 20 compared to 16. It is particularly important to note that very intensive training
courses which might have larger effects are very often worker-sponsored. 25% of worker-
sponsored courses last for at least 50 hours or more, whilst this is true for only 10% of firm-
sponsored training courses. We will investigate the impact of training hours on hourly wages
30
exp0.042−0.015 ≈ 2.7%
31
To test this argument, one could look at firm’s value added or other productivity measures (e.g. Dearden et al.,
2006). Our sample is, however, rather small and such an analysis would go beyond the scope of this study.

23
in future research. Secondly, we do not claim that the link between participation in worker-
sponsored training and wages is a result of higher productivity. Attending a training course on
one’s own initiative, and even more so, one which takes place at least partially in the worker’s
leisure time, gives the firm a strong signal of individual labour attachment. This signal is only
observable if a worker actually attends a training course, but not if the course is cancelled (even
if this was due to random events).
If this is the case, we would expect that wage returns to worker-sponsored training would be
greater for women. In fact, they tend to be smaller. To explain this finding, we investigate
workers’ motivation for participating in training courses. In the survey, workers were asked to
state their main objective in attending training courses. 16.4% of male workers and 14.0% of
female workers cited higher wages. For 23.1% of men and 20.5% of women, career prospects
was the most important motive. Surprisingly, job security is by far the most prominent outcome;
37.9% of men and 42.1% of women cited this as a primary motive. We find that job security
is a significantly more important motive for women than it is for men.32 There are however, no
differences in regard to career prospects or wages.
In addition, workers were asked to make a subjective assessment about the returns to training
(e.g. "From today’s point of view, how did the participation in courses or seminars affect the
following aspects of your work? How did the training course impact your salary?"). In line
with our findings for firm-sponsored training, workers make rather pessimistic assessments of
the impact of training courses on wages and career prospects. For 93.5% of male workers and
97.2% of female workers, participation in training had "no" or "rather no" effect on their salary.
The corresponding numbers for promotion prospects (90.3% resp. 85.4%) are similarly nega-
tive. Individuals are, however, more satisfied with the impact on their individual job security,
with only 42% of male workers and 34% of female workers stating that training participation
had (rather) no effect. The gender difference here suggests that women indeed use training
participation as a signalling device. The primary aim is generally not, however, to gain a wage
increase but rather to improve employment perspectives.
To sum up, we find no wage returns to firm-sponsored training but large returns to worker-
sponsored training. The majority of workers cite job security as their main motivation for par-
ticipating in training. Workers are often fairly satisfied with the impact of attending training on
job security, but not on wages or career prospects. Gender differences are rather small with re-
gard to the benefits of training, although men might gain more from investing themselves. This
might be explained by their greater bargaining power (compare Card et al., 2016). There are
some gender differences between men and women in terms of their motivations for participation
in training. Women in particular attend training in order to improve their job security.
32
Here we regress an indicator of whether job security is a very important motive for participation in training in
a linear regression on firm, worker, job characteristics and unobserved productivity.

24
The aim of this study was to investigate whether gender differences in training participation
can help explain the GWG. The simple answer to this question is that we do not find any such
relationship. Figure 2 shows an Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition of the GWG to which we have
subsequently added groups of variables. The final bar adds participation in firm- and worker-
sponsored training to the decomposition. We see that the explained part of the GWG does not
increase at all. The main reason for this finding is that there are two counterbalancing effects.
Female workers participate more in worker-sponsored training but they gain somewhat less
from these courses than male workers. In addition, women benefit slightly more than men from
firm-sponsored training but they attend fewer such courses. Future research should analyse
long-run wage and career effects of (repeated) training investments.33

6 Conclusions

Human capital is a major causal driver of individual and group differences in wages. Accord-
ingly, many studies have investigated the impact of differences in formal education on the gen-
der wage gap. Research has looked at both the duration of formal education, as well as indi-
viduals’ field of study. Theoretical models have highlighted the significance of participation in
training for gender differences in wages. Empirical evidence in this field does, however, remain
limited. This is surprising insofar as several studies have found that women are provided with
less firm-financed training. In this study, we look at the gender training gap (GTG), i.e. the
male-female difference in average participation rates in different forms of training. We distin-
guish between firm-sponsored training, which takes place during working hours, and training
courses which are initiated by the worker and which overlap with workers’ leisure time.
We confirm findings from previous studies by showing that there is a negative GTG in firm-
sponsored training – on average male workers are 18% more likely than female workers to
be trained on the initiative of the firm during working hours. Whilst this gap can in part be
explained by differences between firms, between male and female workers and the jobs they
perform, a significant proportion of the GTG remains unexplained.
Perhaps surprisingly, firms seem to be less selective in their training decisions than workers.
Firm-sponsored training is more equally distributed across the workforce. Only 41% of the
GTG in firm-sponsored training can be explained by a large set of observable characteristics.
In the case of worker-sponsored training, however, we can explain 68% of the GTG in refer-
ence to such characteristics.34 It is therefore particularly remarkable that we observe a GTG in
33
In a previous version of this paper we used imputed long-run training histories (up to 20-years) and analysed
the impact on the gender wage gap. Even this exercise revealed only a small explanatory power.
34
We have described similar findings in Steffes and Warnke (2016). A decomposition approach based on a
multilevel logit model, revealed that 35% of the individual heterogeneity in participation in training overlapping

25
firm-sponsored training. We show that these gender differences are driven by the group of less
productive workers. Females who do not hold a tertiary degree and who perform routine tasks
receive much less training than their male colleagues. There is not, however, a GTG amongst
the group of highly productive individuals. Job segregation, and in particular the underrepre-
sentation of women in leadership roles, as well as the prevalence of part-time work amongst
female workers, do explain the GTG to some extent. The same holds for unobserved productiv-
ity (although we cannot rule out that this reflects pre-existing discrimination).
It appears that firms do not support female workers who are not in high-wage jobs or who prefer
to maintain more individual flexibility by working part-time. This finding can be explained
neither by lower labour attachment per se, nor by the preferences identified amongst these
workers. If this were the case, we would observe similar gender differences for firm-sponsored
training and for worker-sponsored training. This is not the case. The frequency with which
less productive men and women participate in worker-sponsored training is similar. Such a
finding might be explained by a statistical discrimination model in which firms assign workers
to either a job which requires much training but offers a high wage, or to a job which requires
little training but offers only a low wage, depending on an employee’s gender (Barron et al.,
1993). Female workers may invest themselves in training either to increase their productivity
or to signal that their individual labor attachment is higher than of other less productive women.
This finding is also in line with the considerations of Goldin (2014) who attributes a large
share of gender differences in the labour market to individuals’ willingness to work long hours.
Whilst we cannot rule out that firms discriminate (statistically) against women, there might be
further job segregation between male and female workers which we have not captured. Such
job heterogeneity might arise due to voluntary choices made by the worker. Future research on
gender differences in the labour market should further explore this.
Highly productive female workers participate in firm-sponsored training just as often as their
male counterparts and, in addition, they invest much more often in training themselves. It might
be the case that standards for promotion are higher for women than for men (Lazear and Rosen,
1990) and career-focused women must attend more training than men in order to improve their
career prospects. Signalling may also play an important role here. Highly productive women,
in particular, might additionally invest in training themselves in order to signal their true labour
attachment and job engagement to the firm.
The benefits of participation in training differ between firm-sponsored training and worker-
sponsored training. There is less difference, however, in the benefits seen for male and female
workers. Whilst we do not find large wage returns to firm-sponsored training, wage effects are
higher for attendance of worker-sponsored courses. The latter finding seems to be somewhat

with leisure time is due to differences between workers (observable or unobservable). The comparable figure for
training during working hours is 23%.

26
more pronounced amongst male workers. Workers themselves state that they have not benefited
from training in terms of higher wages or better career prospects. They are, however, more
satisfied with their job security after having attended a training course. We also find that job
security is a more significant objective for participation in a training course than wages or
promotions. This applies in particular to women. The fact that female workers value job security
more than their male peers may explain why returns on worker-sponsored training might be
lower for men. Future research should focus on identifying the long-term effects of repeated
investments in training for men and women, and on heterogeneity regarding wage returns on
different forms of training.

27
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32
A Appendix

A.1 Figures

Figure 1: The Gender-Training Gap for Different Forms of Training and Different Set of Con-
trols

Note: Figure 1 shows the female coefficient δ in Equation (1). The rows show the
different training outcomes and the columns the different set of controls: (1) raw gap,
controlling only for time effects. (2) additionally controlling for socio-demographic
and establishment characteristics. (3) additionally controlling for characteristics of the
job and the employment relationship. (4) additionally adding pre-survey fixed-effects.
Significance levels: ∗ = significant at 10%-level, ∗∗ = significant at 5%-level, ∗∗∗ = sig-
nificant at 1%-level. We report cluster-robust standard error (on the establishment-
level) except for (4) in which we bootstrap standard error (clustered on the firm-level)
to account for the fact that fixed-effects are estimated.

33
 Figure 2: Oaxaca-Blinder Decomposition of the Gender-Wage-Gap

Note: Oaxace-Blinder decomposition of log hourly wages, similar to Equation (2).

The reference group is a pooled regression. Results are available upon request.

34
A.2 Tables

Table 1a: Descriptive Statistics Establishment, Worker and Job Characteristics (Binaries)
Female Male
Absolute Percent Absolute Percent
Female 3,511 100.0 % 6,394 100.0 %
Training Participation 1,785 50.8 % 3,088 48.3 %
Firm-sponsored Training 640 18.2 % 1,412 22.1 %
Worker-sponsored Training 697 19.9 % 673 10.5 %
Year 2007 1,184 33.7 % 2,205 34.5 %
Year 2008 929 26.5 % 1,699 26.6 %
Year 2009 819 23.3 % 1,425 22.3 %
Year 2010 579 16.5 % 1,065 16.7 %
Establishment in Bavaria 674 19.2 % 1,247 19.5 %
Establishment in MV 312 8.9 % 658 10.3 %
Establishment in NRW 1,088 31.0 % 2,085 32.6 %
Establishment in S-H 196 5.6 % 602 9.4 %
Establishment in Saxony 1,241 35.3 % 1,802 28.2 %
Service Sector 2,034 57.9 % 2,324 36.3 %
Public Sector 1,265 36.0 % 631 9.9 %
Employees 100-200 1,027 29.3 % 2,123 33.2 %
Employees 200-500 1,485 42.3 % 2,287 35.8 %
Employees 500-2000 999 28.5 % 1,984 31.0 %
Agreement Sector 2,561 72.9 % 4,382 68.5 %
Agreement Company 224 6.4 % 1,037 16.2 %
Worker Council 3,167 90.2 % 5,984 93.6 %
Low-Skilled 66 1.9 % 70 1.1 %
Vocational Qualification 2,686 76.5 % 4,749 74.3 %
Tertiary Degree 759 21.6 % 1,575 24.6 %
Limited Contract 217 6.2 % 302 4.7 %
Leadersip Responsibilities 676 19.3% % 2,280 35.7 %
Part Time 1,548 44.1 % 162 2.5 %
Computer Work 3,051 86.9 % 5,246 82.0 %
Task production 432 12.3 % 1,977 30.9 %
Task monitoring 772 22.0 % 2,679 41.9 %
Task serving 2,098 59.8 % 2,670 41.8 %
Task repairing 166 4.7 % 1,394 21.8 %
Task buying 611 17.4 % 1,070 16.7 %
Task consulting 2,314 65.9 % 3,570 55.8 %
Task measuring 1,314 37.4 % 3,227 50.5 %
Task organizing 2,369 67.5 % 4,076 63.7 %
Task negotiaing 902 25.7 % 1,661 26.0 %
Task informing 2,135 60.8 % 3,723 58.2 %
Task researching 212 6.0 % 979 15.3 %
Task teaching 824 23.5 % 1,159 18.1 %
Occ. Other Manufacturing 135 3.8 % 491 7.7 %
Occ. Chemicals / Synthetics 28 0.8 % 207 3.2 %
Occ. Metalworking 33 0.9 % 535 8.4 %
Occ. Machine Building 28 0.8 % 688 10.8 %
Occ. Electric <10 <0.3 % ca. 280 ca. 4.5 %
Occ. Assembler 109 3.1 % 198 3.1 %
Occ. Food 57 1.6 % 104 1.6 %
Occ. Product Test / Dispatcher 70 2.0 % 129 2.0 %
Occ. Technical Professionals 60 1.7 % 743 11.6 %
Occ. Technician 145 4.1 % 619 9.7 %
Occ. Purchasing 104 3.0 % 160 2.5 %
Occ. Dealer 412 11.7 % 226 3.5 %
Occ. Drivers / Storemen 89 2.5 % 692 10.8 %
Occ. Organization 824 23.5 % 667 10.4 %
Occ. Health / Nursery 965 27.5 % 360 5.6 %
Occ. Education / Social 280 8.0 % 143 2.2 %
Occ. Other Service 162 4.6 % 152 2.4 %
Note: State S-H refers to Schleswig-Holstein, NRW to North Rhine-Westphalia and
MV to Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The exact numbers for the electric occupations are
anonymized due to the small number of females.

35
Table 1b: Descriptive Statistics Establishment, Worker and Job Characteristics (Continuous)
Female Male
Mean SD Mean SD
Hourly Wage in Euro 13.10 5.10 16.82 8.31
Proxy Unobs. Heterogneity (Std.) -0.12 0.92 0.42 0.86
Age Years 44.1 7.0 44.4 6.7
Work Experience 11.7 4.5 14.9 3.3
Tenure 11.0 5.5 11.4 5.6
Median Wage 83.3 21.1 78.9 17.8
Median Wage Trend 1.9 1.2 2.1 1.4
Wage Compression (Std.) 0.25 1.1 -0.01 1.0
Note: Establishment Characteristics are weighted by sex-specific em-
ployee size. Standardization has been done for the total workforce, see
Appendix A.4.2.

36
 Table 2: Participation in Job-related Training Courses
Dependent Variable: Participation in Job-related Training Courses
Overall Firm-sponsored Worker-sponsored
Year 2008 -0.057* (0.031) 0.018 (0.032) -0.043* (0.023)
Year 2009 -0.024 (0.030) 0.030 (0.030) -0.035 (0.022)
Year 2010 -0.082*** (0.028) 0.025 (0.028) -0.056*** (0.020)
Months 0.036*** (0.013) 0.030** (0.014) 0.009 (0.010)
State Saxony 0.043* (0.022) 0.032* (0.019) 0.027** (0.013)
State Bavaria 0.018 (0.021) 0.015 (0.018) -0.002 (0.013)
State NRW 0.006 (0.021) -0.001 (0.018) 0.017 (0.013)
State MV 0.012 (0.024) 0.001 (0.022) 0.045*** (0.016)
Service Sector 0.027* (0.015) 0.009 (0.014) -0.001 (0.010)
Public Sector -0.028* (0.017) -0.067*** (0.015) 0.029* (0.016)
Employees 100-200 0.009 (0.013) -0.009 (0.011) 0.007 (0.009)
Employees 500-2000 -0.006 (0.012) -0.008 (0.011) 0.009 (0.008)
Median Wage 0.000 (0.000) 0.000 (0.000) 0.000 (0.000)
Median Wage Trend 0.017*** (0.004) 0.014*** (0.004) 0.009*** (0.003)
Wage Compression 0.002 (0.007) 0.014** (0.006) -0.004 (0.004)
Workers’ Council 0.033 (0.020) 0.024 (0.017) 0.011 (0.013)
Tertiary Educ. 0.003 (0.015) -0.030** (0.013) 0.044*** (0.012)
No Voc. Qualification -0.057* (0.034) -0.069*** (0.023) -0.017 (0.015)
Age -0.169* (0.102) -0.167* (0.091) -0.041 (0.078)
Age Squared 0.108 (0.092) 0.124 (0.081) 0.022 (0.069)
Experience 0.000 (0.008) -0.003 (0.007) -0.017*** (0.006)
Limited Contract 0.002 (0.023) -0.021 (0.020) 0.042** (0.018)
Leader 0.060*** (0.013) 0.038*** (0.011) 0.009 (0.008)
Part Time -0.031* (0.019) -0.029* (0.015) 0.018 (0.013)
Computer Work 0.099*** (0.015) 0.035*** (0.012) 0.048*** (0.008)
Task production -0.058*** (0.016) -0.050*** (0.014) -0.007 (0.009)
Task monitoring -0.007 (0.012) -0.009 (0.010) -0.017** (0.008)
Task serving 0.028** (0.011) 0.028*** (0.010) 0.001 (0.008)
Task repairing 0.007 (0.016) 0.000 (0.014) -0.010 (0.009)
Task buying 0.006 (0.014) -0.009 (0.012) 0.013 (0.011)
Task consulting 0.046*** (0.012) 0.022** (0.011) 0.006 (0.009)
Task measuring 0.003 (0.010) 0.015 (0.010) -0.012 (0.008)
Task organizing 0.047*** (0.013) 0.004 (0.011) 0.021** (0.009)
Task negotiaing 0.04*** (0.012) 0.032*** (0.012) 0.003 (0.010)
Task informing 0.06*** (0.013) 0.010 (0.011) 0.023*** (0.009)
Task researching 0.035** (0.017) 0.018 (0.017) 0.021 (0.013)
Task teachning 0.001 (0.013) -0.001 (0.012) 0.008 (0.010)
Occ. Other Manufacturing -0.078** (0.038) -0.085*** (0.031) 0.052** (0.022)
Occ. Chemicals / Synthetics -0.019 (0.042) -0.051 (0.040) 0.082*** (0.029)
Occ. Metalworking -0.100** (0.039) -0.071** (0.034) 0.038 (0.023)
Occ. Machine Building -0.059 (0.037) -0.063** (0.031) 0.072*** (0.023)
Occ. Electrician etc. 0.018 (0.043) -0.072* (0.037) 0.125*** (0.028)
Occ. Assembler -0.177*** (0.041) -0.124*** (0.034) 0.036 (0.024)
Occ. Food -0.137*** (0.042) -0.100*** (0.036) 0.032 (0.025)
Occ. Product Test / Dispatcher -0.052 (0.044) -0.061 (0.040) 0.088*** (0.028)
Occ. Technical Professionals 0.015 (0.033) -0.036 (0.030) 0.009 (0.024)
Occ. Technician -0.021 (0.034) -0.066** (0.029) 0.093*** (0.023)
Occ. Dealer 0.001 (0.039) -0.036 (0.037) 0.067** (0.028)
Occ. Drivers / Storemen -0.085** (0.033) -0.100*** (0.028) 0.083*** (0.023)
Occ. Organization 0.028 (0.027) -0.080*** (0.024) 0.065*** (0.021)
Occ. Health, Nursery 0.120*** (0.027) -0.083*** (0.024) 0.225*** (0.020)
Occ. Education / Social 0.143*** (0.033) -0.094*** (0.029) 0.185*** (0.029)
Occ. Other Service -0.094*** (0.036) -0.106*** (0.029) 0.041* (0.023)
Female -0.021 (0.014) -0.021* (0.012) 0.033*** (0.010)
Proxy Unobs. Heterogneity 0.077*** (0.019) 0.029* (0.015) 0.052*** (0.016)
Constant 0.281*** (0.058) 0.174*** (0.049) -0.017 (0.037)
N 9905 9905 9905
F-Statistic 64.2 17.9 27.4
R2 0.17 0.05 0.11
Note: Mandatory-job training courses are excluded. Regression includes a variable which takes into ac-
count the number of months a worker has been retrospectively asked. Reference occupation is "other
services". We report bootstrap standard error (300 rep.). Significance levels: ∗ = significant at 10%-level,
∗∗ = significant at 5%-level, ∗∗∗ = significant at 1%-level.

37
 Table 3: Decomposition of the Gender Training Gap
Firm-sponsored Worker-sponsored
Raw-Gap -3.9pp +9.4pp
Explained -1.6pp +6.4pp
Firms -1.2pp +0.6pp
Worker +0.4pp +1.3pp
Productivity -0.4pp -1.0pp
Jobs -0.4pp +5.4pp
Occupation -0.1pp +3.8pp
Tasks +1.4pp +1.1pp
Leadership -0.6pp -0.2pp
Part-Time -1.2pp +0.6pp
Unexplained -2.2pp +2.9pp
Note: Table 3 shows the results of the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition
(Equation (2)) for firm- and worker-sponsored training. The reference
group is a pooled regression.

Table 4: Gender Training Gap by Content of Training

Firm-sponsored Worker-sponsored
IT training +0.1% +1.0%***
Foreign language training -0.1% +1.6***%
Commercial training +0.3% -0.1%
Technical training -2.3%*** -0.3%
Social training +0.1% +0.7%
Managerial training -0.6% -0.8%***
Health/safety training -0.4% +0.7%
Note: Table 4 shows the female coefficient δ in Equation (1). The rows show the
different training ouctomes. The set of controls include time effects, worker and
establishment characteristics, job characteristics and occupations (incl. mange-
rial responsibilities and job-tasks), pre-survey fixed-effects. We report bootstrap
standard error (300 rep.). Significance levels: ∗ = significant at 10%-level, ∗∗ =
significant at 5%-level, ∗∗∗ = significant at 1%-level.

Table 5: Gender Training Gap and Presence of Children

Firm-sponsored Worker-sponsored
Child aged 0-3 -0.037 -0.007
Child aged 4-6 +0.016 -0.018
Child aged 7-10 -0.008 +0.004
Child aged 11-18 +0.008 -0.028
Female -.019 +0.029
Female x child aged 0-3 -0.074 -0.073
Female x child aged 4-6 -0.057 +0.004
Female x child aged 7-10 -0.028 -0.055
Female x child aged 11-18 +0.025 +0.033
Note: The set of controls include time effects, worker and establishment charac-
teristics, job characteristics and occupations (incl. mangerial responsibilities and
job-tasks), pre-survey fixed-effects. We do not report (bootstrapped) standard
error here due to the small number of parents of young children.

38
 Table 6: Wage-Returns to Training
Dependent Variable: Log(Hourly Wages)
Firm-spons. Worker-spons. Firm-spons. Worker-spons.
Year 2008 -0.016 (0.02) 0.008 (0.02) -0.011 (0.02) 0.064** (0.03)
Year 2009 -0.004 (0.02) 0.012 (0.02) 0.008 (0.02) 0.062** (0.03)
Year 2010 0.016 (0.02) 0.040* (0.02) 0.010 (0.02) 0.088*** (0.03)
Months -0.014 (0.01) -0.004 (0.01) -0.004 (0.01) 0.029** (0.01)
State Saxony -0.092*** (0.01) -0.082*** (0.02) -0.134*** (0.02) -0.127*** (0.03)
State Bavaria -0.032** (0.01) -0.021 (0.02) -0.035* (0.02) 0.000 (0.03)
State NRW -0.027** (0.01) -0.024 (0.02) -0.005 (0.02) 0.009 (0.03)
State MV -0.100*** (0.02) -0.091*** (0.02) -0.152*** (0.03) -0.140*** (0.04)
Service Sector -0.088*** (0.01) -0.089*** (0.01) -0.065*** (0.02) -0.059*** (0.02)
Public Sector 0.077*** (0.01) 0.076*** (0.01) 0.027 (0.02) 0.024 (0.02)
Agreement Sector 0.043*** (0.01) 0.034*** (0.01) 0.044** (0.02) 0.015 (0.02)
Agreement Company 0.040*** (0.01) 0.039*** (0.01) 0.051** (0.02) 0.052** (0.02)
Employees 100-200 -0.001 (0.01) -0.002 (0.01) -0.007 (0.01) -0.006 (0.02)
Employees 500-2000 -0.004 (0.01) -0.010 (0.01) -0.003 (0.01) -0.020 (0.02)
Median Wage 0.005*** (0.00) 0.006*** (0.00) 0.003*** (0.00) 0.005*** (0.00)
Median Wage Trend 0.057*** (0.00) 0.061*** (0.00) 0.049*** (0.00) 0.066*** (0.01)
Wage Compression 0.000 (0.00) 0.001 (0.00) -0.005 (0.01) -0.006 (0.01)
Workers’ Council 0.051*** (0.01) 0.038** (0.01) 0.063*** (0.02) 0.043* (0.03)
Tertiary Educ. 0.127*** (0.01) 0.143*** (0.01) 0.098*** (0.02) 0.151*** (0.02)
No Voc. Qualification -0.096*** (0.03) -0.104*** (0.03) -0.144** (0.06) -0.177*** (0.06)
Age 0.288*** (0.08) 0.321*** (0.08) 0.245** (0.11) 0.392*** (0.13)
Age Squared -0.256*** (0.07) -0.280*** (0.07) -0.216** (0.10) -0.337*** (0.12)
Experience 0.082*** (0.01) 0.073*** (0.01) 0.082*** (0.01) 0.062*** (0.01)
Limited Contract -0.067*** (0.02) -0.045* (0.02) -0.106** (0.04) -0.043 (0.04)
Leader 0.074*** (0.01) 0.078*** (0.01) 0.061*** (0.01) 0.065*** (0.01)
Part Time -0.170*** (0.02) -0.171*** (0.02) -0.001 (0.02) -0.015 (0.03)
Computer Work -0.019 (0.01) -0.030** (0.01) -0.003 (0.03) -0.056 (0.04)
Task production 0.000 (0.01) 0.008 (0.01) -0.005 (0.02) 0.024 (0.02)
Task monitoring -0.004 (0.01) -0.002 (0.01) -0.009 (0.01) -0.001 (0.02)
Task serving 0.002 (0.01) 0.007 (0.01) -0.011 (0.01) -0.001 (0.02)
Task repairing 0.002 (0.01) -0.001 (0.01) 0.005 (0.01) 0.003 (0.02)
Task buying -0.003 (0.01) -0.011 (0.01) 0.008 (0.01) -0.013 (0.02)
Task consulting 0.010 (0.01) 0.014* (0.01) -0.006 (0.01) 0.004 (0.02)
Task measuring -0.029*** (0.01) -0.032*** (0.01) -0.021** (0.01) -0.026* (0.01)
Task organizing 0.030*** (0.01) 0.029*** (0.01) 0.034*** (0.01) 0.027 (0.02)
Task negotiaing 0.030*** (0.01) 0.031*** (0.01) 0.009 (0.01) 0.011 (0.01)
Task informing 0.018** (0.01) 0.023*** (0.01) 0.010 (0.01) 0.024 (0.02)
Task researching 0.032*** (0.01) 0.028** (0.01) 0.040** (0.02) 0.047** (0.02)
Task teachning 0.007 (0.01) 0.008 (0.01) 0.009 (0.01) 0.023 (0.02)
Occ. Other Manufacturing -0.093*** (0.03) -0.088*** (0.02) -0.138*** (0.04) -0.148*** (0.06)
Occ. Chemicals / Synthetics -0.092*** (0.03) -0.082** (0.03) -0.163*** (0.04) -0.158*** (0.06)
Occ. Metalworking -0.056** (0.02) -0.052** (0.02) -0.070* (0.04) -0.080 (0.06)
Occ. Machine Building -0.065*** (0.02) -0.060*** (0.02) -0.083** (0.03) -0.109** (0.05)
Occ. Electrician etc. 0.001 (0.02) 0.009 (0.03) -0.048 (0.04) -0.052 (0.06)
Occ. Assembler -0.149*** (0.03) -0.152*** (0.03) -0.187*** (0.05) -0.264*** (0.05)
Occ. Food -0.119*** (0.04) -0.149*** (0.04) -0.166*** (0.06) -0.347*** (0.07)
Occ. Product Test / Dispatcher -0.119*** (0.04) -0.115*** (0.04) -0.088** (0.04) -0.077 (0.05)
Occ. Technical Professionals 0.132*** (0.02) 0.121*** (0.02) 0.106*** (0.04) 0.062 (0.05)
Occ. Technician 0.063*** (0.02) 0.064*** (0.02) 0.018 (0.03) 0.012 (0.04)
Occ. Dealer 0.030 (0.03) 0.046 (0.03) 0.003 (0.04) 0.020 (0.05)
Occ. Drivers / Storemen -0.095*** (0.02) -0.087*** (0.02) -0.136*** (0.04) -0.166*** (0.05)
Occ. Organization 0.096*** (0.02) 0.080*** (0.02) 0.078** (0.03) 0.019 (0.04)
Occ. Health, Nursery 0.063*** (0.02) 0.073*** (0.02) 0.027 (0.03) 0.031 (0.03)
Occ. Education / Social 0.150*** (0.03) 0.149*** (0.02) 0.078** (0.04) 0.060 (0.04)
Occ. Other Service -0.232*** (0.03) -0.250*** (0.03) -0.243*** (0.04) -0.353*** (0.06)
Female -0.071*** (0.01) -0.071*** (0.01) -0.062*** (0.02) -0.060** (0.02)
Proxy Unobs. Heterogneity 0.280*** (0.02) 0.276*** (0.02) 0.387*** (0.03) 0.349*** (0.03)
Firm-sponsored Training 0.007 (0.01) 0.011 (0.01)
Firm-sponsored Training x Female 0.018 (0.02) 0.023 (0.02)
Worker-sponsored Training 0.034** (0.01) 0.042** (0.02)
Worker-sponsored Training x Female -0.007 (0.02) -0.015 (0.03)
Constant 2.020*** (0.04) 1.970*** (0.04) 2.130*** (0.07) 2.000*** (0.09)
N 8535 7853 2815 2133
F-Statistic 84.2 84.3 112.5 72
R2 0.74 0.73 0.77 0.74
Comparison Group Approach No No Yes Yes
Note: Excluded are workers who participate in both firm- and worker-sponsored training. Regression includes
a variable which takes into account the number of months a worker has been retrospectively asked. Reference
occupation is "other services". We report bootstrap standard error (300 rep.). Significance levels: ∗ = significant
at 10%-level, ∗∗ = significant at 5%-level, ∗∗∗ = significant at 1%-level.
A.3 Further Analyses

A.3.1 Presence of Children

Here, we consider the role of career interruptions. We investigate how the GTG develops after
a woman has had a child. For this purpose, we add to Equation (1) controls for having children
aged 0-2, 3-5, 6-9 and 10-18 which we interact with being female (see Table 5). Our results
indicate that female workers receive less firm-sponsored training, even if they do not have chil-
dren in the household (-1.9pp, n.s.). In addition, we find that mothers with children below the
age of 10 participate less often in firm-sponsored training than fathers with children in this age
category. Finally, the results show that the GTG for firm-sponsored training is particularly pro-
nounced amongst parents with toddlers (additionally -7.4pp, however the sample size is quite
small). This finding is particularly notable as even male workers with small children up to the
age of three participate less in firm-sponsored training (-4.2pp, n.s.). If we consider worker-
sponsored training, we again find a significant (positive) GTG in worker-sponsored training of
+2.9pp amongst workers without children. We do not find differences between male workers
without children and those with children aged below 10.35 It would seem that being a mother
of small children also lowers a woman’s incentive to invest herself in training.
Our results indeed suggest that as a mother’s children become older, she may invest in training
which she missed when she when her children were younger.36 The coefficients become positive
for women with children aged 11 to 18. While the effect is smaller for firm-sponsored training
(+2.4pp), mothers of teenagers have participation rates for worker-sponsored training which are
an additional 3.5pp higher than those of fathers with children of a similar age.

A.3.2 Turnover Probabilities

Gender differences in training could arise from differences in turnover patterns because firms
may fear that investments in training are lost if a workers leaves after being trained (Royalty,
1996). To test whether different turnover rates between men and women drive our results, we
looked at turnover patterns in WeLL establishments between 2006 and 2010. We ran a logit
regression whether a worker leaves a WeLL establishment on a cubic in age (interacted with
being female), on tenure and tenure squared, occupational status and working hours (skilled
or unskilled blue collar worker, white collar worker, part-time with or without top-up benefits,
freelancer), schooling and being female. This gives us firm- and sex-specific turnover probabil-
35
It is interesting that fathers of children aged 10-18 seem to participate somewhat less in training than fathers
of younger children.
36
Fitzenberger and Muehler (2014) do not find evidence for such catch-up effects after parental leave. They use
four-year administrative personnel records of a multinational firm.

40
ities with may vary with age.
Next, we simply predict the turnover probability for each individual. Male workers have a lower
turnover probability of than females (the median predicted turnover probability is 4.7% for men
and 6.7% for women). Age differences between men and women are pronounced (conditional
on tenure and job status): We find somewhat higher turnover probabilities for women in their
early thirties while men leave WeLL establishments with a considerable higher probability in
the age range of 40 and 55.
If we include this measure of firm- and sex-specific turnover probabilities, we see that main
results remain robust. This indicates that differences in turnover rates are not the main driver of
training differences.

A.4 Further Information

A.4.1 Population of WeLL-Establishments

The link to social security data allows us to observe employment biographies of all employees
working at WeLL establishments between 2006 and 2010 (independent of being a survey par-
ticipant or not). Employment biographies date back to the 1970’s for Western Germany and to
the early 1990’s for Eastern Germany. They cover all employment spells subject to social se-
curity (excluding civil servants and self-employed). This data contains information about daily
wages, job status (part-time employment, white-collar, unskilled or skilled blue-collar work),
education and qualification, firm switches. It provides the opportunity to calculate exact tenure
and work experience for each worker.
We use this information to extract pre-survey wage fixed-effects, the amount of wage com-
pression among full-time workers in an establishment and to calculate sex- and establishment-
specific turnover rates. For the analyses based on the population of the WeLL establishments,
we use information between 2000 and 2010 (depending on the analysis). The extraction of pre-
survey wage fixed-effects is based on all employment spells; for the other measures we only
refer to those workers actually working in one of the 149 WeLL establishments.
We drop individuals aged below 20 or above 60 and employees who work from home or who
have a daily wage of less than 1 Euro. This leaves us with a population of ca. 65,900 (unique)
workers in 2006 whereof 54,300 are employed in one of the 149 WeLL establishments.37 The
minimum number of workers in an establishment is ca. 100 and the maximum 2000.
Wages in the social security data are top-coded at the social security threshold. As in Dustmann
et al. (2009), we calculate separate tobit regressions for men and women and for three differ-
37
This figure is comparable to the population of WeLL employees from which survey participants for the first
wave are drawn (Huber and Schmucker, 2012).

41
ent education groups independently for each year between 2000-2010 for full-time employees
controlling for the state of the employer, for age, age squared (interacted with working in East-
ern Germany), job status (e.g. part-time, white-collar/blue-collar, master craftsmen), highest
schooling degree and occupation. We correct the educational information in the social security
based on Fitzenberger et al. (2006).

A.4.2 Proxy for Unobserved Heterogeneity (Pre-Survey Wage Fixed-Effects)

To assess unobserved productivity differences between workers, we look at the wage biogra-
phies of workers prior to the survey period (see also our discussion in Section 4.5) for another
interpretation). We run a log-linear fixed-effects estimation of log daily wages on experience,
experience squared, tenure and job status (e.g. blue-collar or white-collar, master craftsmen,
part-time worker) for the period 2000-2006.38 In this analysis, we include not only survey
participants in WeLL but also biographies of all other employees who work during the survey
period in one of the WeLL establishments to increase the efficiency of our estimates. This leaves
us with 437,793 observations.
We standardize the fixed-effects (for the total population) by subtracting the mean and dividing
by the standard deviation. This gives a mean of standardized pre-survey wage fixed effect for
the sample of survey participants used here of 0.42 for men and -0.12 for women (the median is
almost equal to the mean). The standard deviation of fixed-effects is with 0.92 larger for women
than for men (0.86).39
According to Wooldridge (2002), a proxy variable has to fulfil two properties. The first is ig-
norability (or also called redundancy), it requires the proxy variable z to be ignorable if the
     
unobserved productivity q would be available E y  X, q, z = E y  X, q . This requirement
is comparable to an instrumental variable which should also be redundant in case the unobserv-
ables would be added to the model. The second property requires the correlation between the
unobserved variable q and each observable xj to be zero after conditioning on z. Wooldridge
     
(2002) describes this requirement via a linear projection L q  1, x1 , ..., xk , z = L q  1, z .
The latter property requires a high correlation between the proxy and the unobservable. This
is different from the IV-approach where the correlation between the instrument and the unob-
servable must be zero. We apply a two-stage bootstrap procedure to account for the fact that
pre-survey fixed-effects are estimated from the data.
38
We do not include further variables such as education, occupation or firm characteristics, since those are
mostly time-invariant.
39
The standard deviation of pre-survey wage fixed effect for the sample of survey participants considered in this
analyses is smaller than 1. This is due to the fact that we drop certain individuals for the analyses who probably
have quite distinct fixed-effects (very low or large) due to low wages (less than one Euro per day), low working
hours (less than 15 hours a week), low or high age (20-60 to calculate the fixed-effects but 25-54 in the final
analyses), foreigners etc.

42
A.4.3 Training Definition

Basic information about training participation (start and end date) are available for all train-
ing courses while detailed information has been collected for up to three most recent training
courses per wave. Only 4% of workers in our sample participate in more than three training
courses and we exclude those workers from our analyses because we miss information about
the financing of the fourth and further training courses.40
We have limited the analyses here to the incidence in participation in training. Results are,
however, very similar if we consider the number of training courses attended by a worker (up to
three). We also find a large GTG in terms of the duration (in hours) of firm-sponsored training
courses attended by male and female workers. Male workers participate on average 8.3 hours in
firm-sponsored training and female workers only 5.7 hours. For the case of worker-sponsored
training the picture is reversed, men attend these courses on average for 10.4 hours and women
for 16.0 hours.
As noted above, we do not consider here training courses which are initiated by the worker
and which take place completely in working hours (”shared investments”). The GTG in shared
investment courses generally lies somewhere between that seen for firm- and worker-sponsored
training and we do nob observe significant gender differences.

A.4.4 Occupations and Job Tasks

To account for possible differences in the job content between men and women, we add infor-
mation about the occupations and the tasks performed at work to our specifications. We define
17 occupational groups and 13 job tasks (se Table 1a).41 Information about job-tasks is very
similar to those used by Black and Spitz-Oener (2010). Workers self-report job-tasks such as
computer use, teaching, controlling machines or serving / accommodating. Respondents in the
survey were asked whether they perform a task "frequently", "seldom" or "never". We consider
here only job-tasks which are frequently performed.42 Table 1a shows that women perform
more often interactive tasks such as consulting, teaching or serving while men are clearly more
frequently involved in researching, production, monitoring, measuring or repairing. There are
few differences in negotiating or informing tasks, among others.
40
We leave individuals who participate in more than three courses who stated that they participated both in firm-
sponsored and worker co-financed training courses (among the three courses with detailed information) because
here we do not face this uncertainty. Our previous research using the WeLL data showed that we get similar results
about training patterns whether those workers are included or not (Steffes and Warnke, 2016).
41
Occupations are aggregated from the German two-digit classification of occupations (KldB-1988) available in
social security data. Not all occupations appear in an adequate number in our sample, e.g. agricultural or wood
processing occupations are underrepresented. So we treat these occupations as "other".
42
Rohrbach-Schmidt and Tiemann (2013) give an excellent overview about task measurement in different
datasets.

43