Wrong side of the track? The impact of the minimum wage on gender pay gaps in Britain

We study the impact of the introduction of the National Minimum Wage (NMW) in Britain on various gender wage gaps. Other things equal, if women are over-represented amongst the low paid, we might expect to see the introduction of the NMW narrowing the overall gender pay gap. Using six years of Labour Force Survey data we assess the evidence before and after the introduction of the NMW at various quantiles in the aggregate wage distribution. We go on to document how the proportion of females in various occupations affects male and female pay before and after the advent of the minimum wage. We conclude that there is only moderate evidence of any change in the rate of decline in the average gender pay gap around the period the NMW was introduced.