A Career of Segregation: The Integration of Specialized Women into the Job Market

Occupational segregation by gender is a perennial theme in studies of gender inequality, as occupations are determining factors of income, lifestyles, and identities. Occupations with a high representation of women are generally those with lower social prestige and remuneration. Consequently, the study of this issue is central to explaining the socioeconomic disadvantages faced by women (WEEDEN, 1998; WONG, CHARLES, 2020).

In this context, considering that educational qualifications are crucial elements in the allocation of individuals in the labor market, if there is horizontal gender segregation within higher education—meaning that men and women choose their fields of study differently—this will be reflected in subsequent occupational segregation. Thus, educational choices are relevant in the processes of occupational segregation (MORGAN, GELBGISER, WEEDEN, 2012; BARONE, ASSIRELLI, 2020). This means that the significant changes over the past few decades regarding women's education in Brazil have the potential to profoundly impact patterns of occupational segregation by gender.

Therefore, this study aims to estimate how much of the persistent gender occupational segregation in the Brazilian labor market is attributable to educational gender segregation. Using harmonized data from the Demographic Censuses conducted by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) between 1980 and 2010, we decompose the Dissimilarity Index based on the methodological strategies of Zheng and Weeden (2023), which utilize the mean differences method developed by Fosset (2017) and apply the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition. Through this approach, we can depict the scenario of gender occupational segregation over time in Brazil, understanding the extent to which horizontal segregation in higher education accounts for a considerable part of the persistent occupational segregation and how much is related to the differing probabilities of men and women entering the labor market. Notably, fields of study that are predominantly female and in STEM have the greatest effect on occupational segregation.