Pay, promotion and parenthood amongst women solicitors

The article examines the workplace sources of sex-based and gendered pay differentials in professional labour markets. Solicitors are among the highest paying professionals, yet women solicitors receive on average only 58 percent of the earnings received by men solicitors, well below an 82 percent average for all British employees in 1999. From survey data we find that women solicitors have fewer prospects of promotion, and receive lower rewards than men for both promotion and experience. From interview data we find that sex-differences in access to reputation-building activities generate qualitative differences in participation (specifically, in carrying out legal work not chargeable to a client) which are consistent with differential outcomes found in the survey data.