Jul 23, 2009

More evidence on height-related wage gap

Greg Mankiw would be happy to see this study, which appeared today on the Telegraph. New evidence finds that a wage gap between tall and short men exist not only in Britain and the US, but also in Australia. The study finds that if you are approximately 1.77 meters (5ft 10 inches), if you had been 1.82 m (or 6 ft) this would have increased your salary by 1.5 % per year.
There are several explanations for this result, but the one I prefer (de gustibus) relates to self confidence: if you are taller than your peers in your childhood, this boosts the perception of yourself in future life. When you are self confident, you gain more respect from other people, and thus you advance faster in your career (does anyone believe wages are really related to productivity?). The other interesting results are: the same does not hold for women; fat men do not earn less than slimmer colleagues.

1 comment:

Cam said...

I feel richer already...