教育能缓解性别收入差距吗?

Can Education Reduce the Gender Earnings Differential?

With the non-farm sample data from the ＂Chinese General Social Survey in 2006， 2008 & 2010＂， this paper tries to explore the impact of education on the gender earnings differential under the premise of distinguishing between the productive function and signaling function of education. Key findings are summarized as follows: Firstly， although women do not lag behind men in the amount of investment on education， the gender gap in earnings is still prominent; Secondly， due to the obvious sex discrimination in the labor market， the productive returns to education of men are significantly higher than that of women， which enlarges approximately 103 percent of gender earnings differential; Thirdly， the signaling returns to education of women are significantly higher than that of men and the signaling function of education is conducive to reducing sex discrimination in the labor market， which narrows about 80 percent of gender earnings differential. These findings may provide evidence for the formulation of policy to narrow the gender earnings differential.