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Gender pay gaps persist as a significant feature of labor markets in developing countries, with disparities varying across the wage distribution and between urban and rural areas. Using data from the 2012, 2015, and 2017 Labor Force Surveys, we investigate wage discrimination and its implications for women's labor force participation, incorporating corrections for potential selection bias. Beyond the traditional Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition, we employ the Recentered Influence Function decomposition to analyze gaps across the distribution. Our results show that wage gaps are more pronounced at the lower end of the distribution, suggesting that women face significant challenges in securing equal compensation and advancing in their careers. However, once they reach leadership positions, they tend to earn comparable wages. Complementary Oaxaca-Blinder decompositions reveal a significant gender wage gap in urban areas, with women earning 8.3% and 3.4% less than men in 2012 and 2017, respectively. The unexplained gap, often associated with potential discrimination, decreased from 25% to 11% over the period. In rural areas, the gap reached 41.8% in 2012 and 25.4% in 2017, indicating a narrowing trend. Our results highlight the need for targeted public policies to address the structural barriers women face, particularly in low-paid jobs and rural labor markets.

There has been considerable interest in using decomposition methods in epidemiology (mediation analysis) and economics (Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition) to understand how health disparities arise and how they might change upon intervention. It has not been clear when estimates from the Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition can be interpreted causally because its implementation does not explicitly address potential confounding of target variables. While mediation analysis does explicitly adjust for confounders of target variables, it typically does so in a way that effectively entails equalizing confounders across racial groups, which may not reflect the intended intervention. Revisiting prior analyses in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth on disparities in wages, unemployment, incarceration, and overall health with test scores, taken as a proxy for educational attainment, as a target intervention, we propose and demonstrate a novel decomposition that controls for confounders of test scores (e.g. measures of childhood socioeconomic status [SES]) while leaving their association with race intact. We compare this decomposition with others that use standardization (to equalize childhood SES [the confounders] alone), mediation analysis (to equalize test scores within levels of childhood SES), and one that equalizes both childhood SES and test scores. We also show how these decompositions, including our novel proposals, are equivalent to implementations of the Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition, but provide a more formal causal interpretation for these decompositions.

Background The increasing mental health inequalities between native- and foreign-born persons in Sweden is an important public health issue. Improving social integration has been stressed as a key strategy to combat this development. While a vast amount of studies have confirmed the importance of social integration for good mental health, less is known about the role of different types of social integration, and how they relate to mental health inequalities. This study aimed to examine the extent to which indicators of social integration explained mental health inequalities between the native- and foreign-born. Methods Based on the Health on Equal Terms survey from 2011/2015 in Västra Götaland, Sweden ( n  = 71,643), a non-linear Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition analysis was performed comparing native- and foreign-born individuals from Nordic-, European- and non-European countries. The General Health Questionnaire was used to assess psychological distress, while 11 items assessed employment conditions and economic disparities, social relations, and experiences of discrimination to measure different aspects of social integration. Results Differences in social integration explained large proportions of observed mental health differences between the native- and foreign-born. Important indicators included low levels of social activity (20%), trust in others (17%) and social support (16%), but also labour market disadvantages, such as being outside the labour market (15%), unemployment (10%) and experiencing financial strain (16%). In analyses stratified by region of origin, low trust in others and discrimination contributed to the mental health gap between the native-born and European-born (17 and 9%, respectively), and the native-born and non-European-born (19 and 10%, respectively). Precarious labour market position was a particularly important factor in the mental health gap between the native-born and Nordic-origin (22%), and non-European origin (36%) populations. Conclusion Social integration factors play a central role in explaining the mental health inequality between natives and migrants in Sweden. Our findings suggest that public health actions targeting mental health gaps could benefit from focusing on inequalities in social and economic recourses between natives and migrants in Sweden. Areas of priority include improving migrants’ financial strain, as well as increasing trust in others and social support and opportunities for civic engagement.

The paper analyses the relationship between human capital formation and income growth in Burkina Faso using data from household surveys conducted in 2009 and 2018. By combining estimates from multiple linear regressions of the impact of human capital variables on income with variance decomposition techniques, this paper quantifies the contribution of education, health, underemployment, and dietary diversity to income growth. It distinguishes between the shares related to the effects of increasing capital factor endowments and those related to the returns on these endowments. The results demonstrate that an increase in human capital endowment is a key factor in determining workers' income growth. Furthermore, the impact of human capital on income growth is greater when the endowment and return effects of these factors are both positive and high. These results also indicate that a significant improvement in household income is more likely to be achieved by interventions focused on both increasing human capital endowments and improving human capital outcomes.

The idea that the wage gap (W.G.) between the public sector (P.U.S.) and private sectors (P.R.S.) has widened is a point of contention among scholars, but to date, there has been no systematic discussion of changes in the W.G. and their causes in China. This article combines data from China's Urban Household Survey (U.H.S.) for 2004, 2008 and 2013 to examine changes in between-sector W.G.s and identify the causal factors by wage decomposition methods. Using ordinary least squares and a Heckman sample selection model, this study finds that public-sector workers consistently earn more than private-sector workers and that the W.G. is expanding, especially in upstream industries where state-owned enterprises (S.O.E.s) have monopoly status. In addition, the Oaxaca-Blinder (O.B.) decomposition method is adopted to reveal that the characteristic effect is the main cause of the W.G. Further, the regression and decomposition of the recentered influence function show that the effect of characteristics and coefficient effects differ across wage quantiles. This article indicates that the intersectoral W.G. in China is widening mainly as a result of differences in labour endowments and provides evidence to support government decision-making.

The Pink Tide had a profound political and economic impact on Latin America. While the existing literature explores its drivers and reversal, this article addresses a gap by combining two decomposition methods with a dataset on values and perceptions. It makes three contributions. First, it quantifies the role of two key drivers: slow structural changes in society and faster shifts in political preferences. Second, it identifies which segments of the electorate experienced the largest preference shifts, using a novel combination of Oaxaca–Blinder and recentered influence function regressions—yielding the first empirical estimates of changes across the preference distribution. Third, it expands the use of these decomposition techniques beyond economic outcomes, offering tools for broader political analysis. The results show that 90 percent of the leftward shift during the Pink Tide stemmed from changes in voter preferences, not strategic “vote lending.” The entire ideological distribution moved leftward, not just centrist voters. Similarly, the rightward reversal was driven entirely by preference changes and extended across nearly the whole electorate.   JEL Classification Codes: D72; O54; C21; C51; P16

Despite the increased focus on housing choices among rural–urban migrants in China, there is a lack of studies on city size and housing purchase preferences. In this paper, we extend the conceptual framework of the Rosen–Roback model to analyse how city size affects rural–urban migrants’ housing purchase intention, and find that the impact of city size on the willingness to buy a house in the host city for migrants has an inverted U shape by using the China Migrants Dynamic Survey of 2014. To explain this phenomenon, we further adopt the Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition, which shows that rural–urban migrants have achieved a spatial equilibrium between housing costs and city amenities in large cities, compared with megacities and small cities. Specifically, the amenities in large cities can compensate for the negative impact of the high housing cost, making these large cities more attractive than small ones for rural–urban migrants, while rural migrants have to bear high housing prices and exclusive urban welfare because of the strict household registration system in megacities. This study thus sheds new light on the adoption of diversified housing policies to solve the housing problems of rural–urban migrants in China by considering city size. 尽管中国越来越关注农民工的住房选择，但涉及城市规模和住房购买偏好的研宄却很少。 本文扩展了 Rosen-Roback模型的概念框架，以分析城市规模对农民工购房意愿的影响，并 且，采用2014年中国流动人口动态监测调查的数据，我们发现城市规模对农民工在工作地 城市购房意愿的影响呈倒U型。为了解释这一现象，我们进一步采用了 Oaxaca-Blinder分解 法，因素分解表明，与超大城市和小城市相比，农民工在大城市实现了住房成本和城市便 利设施之间的空间均衡。具体而言，大城市的便利设施可以弥补高房价带来的负面影响， 使这些大城市比小城市对农民工更具吸引力，而在超大城市，由于严格的户籍制度，农民 工不得不承受高房价和城市福利的排他性。因此，本研宄通过考虑城市规模，为中国采取 多元化住房政策解决农民工住房问题提供了新的思路。

In the past three decades, the prevalence of under-5 wasting in the Philippines has generally fluctuated between 6% and 8%. However, between 2013 and 2018, the decline in the wasting prevalence (–2.3 percentage points) in the Philippines was sharp and statistically significant. Still, the numbers remain substantial, with around 630,000 children in the Philippines still affected by wasting, who could be at risk of mortality. Thus, this progress must be sustained to meet targets, including the Sustainable Development Goals (Goal #1, prevalence of child malnutritionmanifesting as wasting at 3.9%). Using the 2013 and 2018 rounds of the National Nutrition Survey (NNS), we identified the factors contributing to this decline during these periods using the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition model. We found that total energy, wealth quintile, and maternal nutrition status have sufficient statistical evidence to determine weight-for-height Z-score (wasting) and the improvement in the economic outcomes of household (wealth), maternal nutrition status, and energy intake could explain in part the improvement in the wasting status of children in the Philippines between 2013 and 2018. Sustaining public efforts for maternal and child health during the critical window of opportunity, along with addressing underlying and enabling determinants such as adequate food and health services, optimal feeding practices, and having sufficient resources is critical in further reducing the wasting prevalence in the country. Further studies to examine other factors including child morbidity and diet diversity are recommended to assess if they could explain the rest of the gap in wasting prevalence during this period. •Child wasting in the Philippines sharply declined between 2013 and 2018.•Total energy, wealth quintile, and maternal nutrition status determine wasting.•Increased wealth, maternal nutrition, and total energy intake explain the decline.

The U.S. urban‐rural export gap is important given the share of manufactured goods in exports, the rural concentration of manufacturing activity, and recent federal investments in place‐based policy. These investments raise questions about the size of the export gap and whether it is explained by differences in endowments or inherent rural disadvantages. Confidential trade data linked with business survey data alongside county‐level variables allow an Oaxaca‐Blinder decomposition of the export gapUrban factors compensate for a less trade favorable industry mix, including the advantages of urban scale in export performance which may be insurmountable for rural areas.

About one-third of under-five Filipino children are stunted, with significant socio-economic inequality. This study aims to quantify factors that explain the large gap in stunting between poor and non-poor Filipino children. Using the 2015 Philippine National Nutrition Survey, we conducted a linear probability model to examine the determinants of child stunting and then an Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition to explain the factors contributing to the gap in stunting between poor and non-poor children. Philippines. 1881 children aged 6-23 months participated in this study. The overall stunting prevalence was 38·5 % with a significant gap between poor and non-poor (45·0 % . 32·0 %). Maternal height, education and maternal nutrition status account for 26 %, 18 % and 17 % of stunting inequality, respectively. These are followed by quality of prenatal care (12 %), dietary diversity (12 %) and iron supplementation in children (5 %). Maternal factors account for more than 50 % of the gap in child stunting in the Philippines. This signifies the critical role of maternal biological and socio-economic circumstances in improving the linear growth of children.