The gender pay gap in Kazakhstan: evidence from the EBRD Life in Transition Survey

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to empirically analyze the gender pay gap in Central Asia and Russia and to place Kazakhstan in the context of comparison with these countries. The authors of this article reviewed more than ten publications in the area to understand what is the gender pay gap, why it could exist and how it affects the economy. We then estimated the gender pay gap in Kazakhstan and its neighboring countries – Russia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan - on the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development survey data for 2016. We have found that the gender pay gap has expected signs and magnitude in three countries (Kazakhstan, Russia and Uzbekistan) where we found that women earn about 25% less than men, but is not statistically significant in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. We believe that this should be explained by a worse economic situation in these countries where possibly all people earn low wages independent of where they work and what is their gender. This is not testable with our data; therefore we leave it for future research.