Sri Lanka's logistics and maritime industry: the gender wage inequality in Sri Lanka’s logistics and maritime industry

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of gender in determining the earnings in Sri Lanka's logistics and maritime industry, a crucial sector for the country's economy. The importance of this research is underscored by the logistics and maritime industry's significant role in economic development and the broader context of gender wage disparities. Previous research in Sri Lanka has shown a persistent gender pay gap in the labor force, even though females often have higher educational achievements. However, no specific studies have addressed the logistics and maritime sectors in Sri Lanka, though a few have examined the overall labor force. This study fills that gap by employing Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression to identify wage determinants and the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition method to analyze the wage gap. Using data from 400 participants with a 97.5 percent response rate, the OLS results reveal that being female is associated with earning approximately 0.16 log points less per hour than a male counterpart. Decomposition analysis further shows that out of the overall wage difference of 0.3624 log points, 53.3 percent can be explained by productive characteristics such as education and experience, while 46.7 percent remains unexplained, suggesting potential gender-based discrimination. The fact that the explained portion of the wage gap is significantly higher indicates that productive characteristics have a more substantial impact on wage disparities.