[ABSTRACT:] We use a hypothetical choice methodology to estimate preferences for workplace attributes from a sample of high-ability undergraduates attending a highly selective university. We estimate that women on average have a higher willingness to pay (WTP) for jobs with greater work flexibility and job stability, and men have a higher WTP for jobs with higher earnings growth. These job preferences relate to college major choices and to actual job choices reported in a follow-up survey four years after graduation. The gender differences in preferences explain at least a quarter of the early career gender wage gap.

. . . .Combining these workplace preferences with unique data on the students’ perceptions of jobs which would be offered to them given their major choice, we quantify the role of anticipated future job characteristics—particularly the nonpecuniary aspects of these jobs—in choice of major, a key human capital investment decision. Women, in particular, are found to be more sensitive to nonpecuniary job aspects in major choice than men. Our analysis indicates that at least a quarter of the gender gap in early career earnings—expected as well as actual—can be explained by the systematic gender differences in workplace characteristics. Our analysis indicates that a substantial part of the early gender gap in earnings we observe is a compensating differential in which women are willing to give up higher earnings to obtain other job attributes.