Аннотация:This article investigates the influence of race-gender composition on pay deterioration in occupations. The analyses use occupation-level data derived from Current Population Surveys to model wage changes from 1971–1981 and 1982–1992. I demonstrate wage erosion—for white men and other incumbents-in female-dominated fields, and show the effect to be driven by white women's representation. Pay also eroded in occupations with a large share of African American men. These longitudinal investigations provide much-needed context for cross-sectional studies, which cannot discern temporal dynamics in the pay-composition association. The results here provide clear evidence of a causal relationship: occupational composition influences wages. I suggest that composition-related wage degradation is due to the greater vulnerability of occupations where subordinate groups are overrepresented and may become manifest via diverse mechanisms related to incumbents' low social status. This discussion pushes beyond the assumption that pay penalties are due only to cultural devaluation.
