A man's blessing or a woman's curse? The family earnings gap of doctors

Abstract

We examine the size and determinants of the family earnings gap for Australian general practitioners (GPs). Female GPs with children earn more than $30,000 less than comparable female GPs without children, while male GPs with children earn more than $45,000 more than comparable male GPs without children. The main determinants of the family gap are differences in observable characteristics such as working hours, labor-force attachment, and demographics, and additionally, for men, entrepreneurship and practice size. A fixed-effects extension of the analysis confirms both the carer effect of children on female GPs and the breadwinner effect of children on male GPs.