Inequality in wages and salaries has typically been viewed through two distinct perspectives. One perspective adopts a macro-level focus on the societal distribution of wages and salaries, as captured by summary measures of inequality such as the Gini coefficient. Another perspective adopts a more micro-level focus on the determination of individual wages and salaries, as estimated by statistical models of the wage and salary determination process. The former perspective focuses on overall inequality in wages and salaries, while the latter perspective focuses on wage and salary differentials based on characteristics such as age, gender, number and age of children, education, and occupation.

In this seminar, these two distinct perspectives will be formally linked through an investigation of the developments that occurred in inequality in wages and salaries among employees between the late 1970s and the mid-1990s in seven OECD countries, with a particular focus on the increases in inequality that took place in Australia, Canada, and the United States. Changes in overall inequality in wages and salaries among employees, as measured by the Gini coefficient, will be discussed and linked to changes that occurred in wage and salary differentials based on age, gender, number and age of children, education, and occupation. The role played in these changes by developments in the institutional contexts within these countries, in particular, developments that occurred in the institutions by which labour markets are regulated, will also be discussed.

James Rice is a sociologist with research interests in the allocation of income and time in contemporary societies. His current research projects focus on comparative analyses of changing income distributions, job mobility and separation in public and private organisations, and economic transfers between generations within the context of population ageing. His co-authored book Discretionary Time: A New Measure of Freedom (Cambridge University Press, 2008) was awarded the International Social Science Council 2009 Stein Rokkan Prize for Comparative Social Science Research. He is a PhD Candidate with ADSRI.