Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP9185
Authors: Jennifer Hunt; Jean-Philippe Garant; Hannah Herman; David Munroe
Abstract: We investigate women's underrepresentation among holders of commercialized patents: only 5.5% of holders of such patents are female. Using the National Survey of College Graduates 2003, we find only 7% of the gap in patenting rates is accounted for by women's lower probability of holding any science or engineering degree, because women with such a degree are scarcely more likely to patent than women without. Differences among those without a science or engineering degree account for 15%, while 78% is accounted for by differences among those with a science or engineering degree. For the latter group, we find that women's underrepresentation in engineering and in jobs involving development and design explain much of the gap.
Keywords: gender; innovation
JEL Codes: J15; O31
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Probability of holding a science or engineering degree (SE) (C19) | Patenting rates (O34) |
| Educational attainment (SE degree) (I21) | Rate of patenting (O38) |
| Job characteristics (M54) | Patenting outcomes (O34) |
| Educational background (SE) (I21) | Commercialized patents (O34) |
| Underrepresentation in patent-intensive fields and job tasks (J79) | Gender patenting gap (J16) |