China’s ‘sticky floor’

Economic success in China will hinge on fixing the gender inequality among its workers.

China’s transformation to a market-oriented economy has been accompanied by a significant increase in the pay gap between men and women. In many industrialized economies, gender-based differences are most pronounced in white-collar jobs, creating a “glass ceiling” for women who work in the office. But as China industrializes, gender pay differences are most striking among blue-collar workers. In this video interview, economists Li Bo and Chi Wei from China’s Tsinghua University consider whether China’s female factory workers labor on a “sticky floor.” The professors are the recent recipients of the first McKinsey Economics Award issued by the McKinsey China Council of Business Economists. Janamitra Devan of the McKinsey Global Institute conducted the interview in February 2009.

Read the transcript.