Table 1

Role of erosion of unions on wage inequality, 1979–2017

Inequality measure Change in measure Percent of change in measure explained by erosion of unions*
Men
90/10 wage gap 0.32 27.3%
90/50 wage gap 0.33 37.3%
50/10 wage gap -0.01
Standard deviation (log wages) 0.12 28.8%
Gini coefficient 0.08 36.7%
Women
90/10 wage gap 0.49 4.3%
90/50 wage gap 0.28 13.0%
50/10 wage gap 0.21 -6.6%
Standard deviation (log wages) 0.16 6.7%
Gini coefficient 0.10 8.8%

* Direct and spillover effect

Note: The wage gaps represent the difference between wages of workers at different percentiles in the wage distribution, where the 50th percentile worker is the median worker.

Source: Analysis of Fortin, Lemieux, and Lloyd 2021.

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