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This article examines the relative employment situation of female employees from a novel perspective based on the construction of multidimensional indicators of employment precariousness that allow examining its scale and nature. The evidence obtained for Spain shows that both the intensity and incidence of precarious employment are significantly higher for women, to the point that half of the women are multidimensionally precarious (with an incidence which is 40% higher than that of men) and precarious females simultaneously suffer on average from nearly three deficiencies in their jobs. Although female employment precariousness is highly persistent over time, it also exhibits significant oscillations plausibly linked to changes in the economy's cyclical position and in labour market regulations. Moreover, it exhibits a great heterogeneity by subgroups (it has even an extreme nature for certain subgroups of females) and by individuals (25% of women suffer between three and six job deficiencies, which compares with 24% of women having jobs without any type of deficiency). Finally, although the greater labour precariousness of women is largely explained by their observed characteristics, particularly by their greater presence in part-time jobs, women still have a greater probability of being precarious than observationally similar men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the gender wage gap in the Spanish hospitality industry versus the rest of the economy. Decomposition techniques are applied to a nationwide representative sample that includes matched employer–employee data allowing an accurate quantification of the phenomenon and its determinants. The methodologies used allow us to examine the average gender wage gap and also how this gap behaves throughout the wage distribution. According to the results, the gender wage gap in hospitality is rather significant (although slightly lower compared with the rest of the economy) and exhibits a steeper profile along the wage distribution. A large part of the gap is explained by observable characteristics, as female hospitality workers have lower levels of seniority than men, are overrepresented in low-skilled occupations, have less supervisory responsibilities, and are segregated into low-wage firms. Although potentially direct discrimination seems to be lower in hospitality, it is not a negligible problem, as, in its most conservative measure (namely, when observationally identical male and female employees working in the same firm are compared), it accounts for as much as 0.05 log points or 30% of the raw gender wage gap. The evidence also shows that the particularly intense gender wage gap observed in the uppermost part of the wage distribution in the hospitality industry arises because more qualified women in the sector are doubly penalized by an intense segregation into comparatively worse jobs and by an unfavorable wage treatment with respect to comparable men, which is consistent with the glass-ceiling phenomenon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]