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Using thousands of essays written by 11-year-olds in 1969, we construct an index measuring girls’ conformity to gender norms then prevalent in Britain. We link this index to outcomes over the life-cycle. Conditional on age-11 covariates, a one standard deviation increase in our index predicts a 3.5% decline in lifetime earnings, due to lower wages and fewer hours worked. Education, occupation and family formation mediate half of this decline. Holding skills constant, girls who conform less to gender norms live in regions with higher female employment and university attendance, highlighting the role of the environment in which girls grow up.
Authors

PhD Candidate London School of Economics

Research Fellow University of Bristol
Uta is an IFS Research Fellow and University of Bristol lecturer with an interest in the development of inequalities over the lifecycle.

CPP Co-Director
Eric is the Montague Burton Professor of Industrial Relations and Labour Economics at the University of Cambridge and Professor of Economics at UCL.

Research Associate Yale University
Cormac is a Research Associate of the IFS, an Assistant Professor of Economics at the Yale University and Research Fellow at the NBER.
Working Paper details
- DOI
- 10.1920/wp.ifs.2024.3224
- Publisher
- Institute for Fiscal Studies
Suggested citation
Ayyar, S et al. (2024). Imagine your life at 25: Gender conformity and later-life outcomes. 24/32. London: Institute for Fiscal Studies. Available at: https://ifs.org.uk/publications/imagine-your-life-25-gender-conformity-and-later-life-outcomes-0 (accessed: 10 February 2025).
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