The Math Gender Gap and Women’s Career Outcome

Vol 21, No, 2, 2023
by Renée B. Adams, Brad M. Barber and Terrance Odean

We show that the gender gap in mathematics is related to women’s career outcomes. The math gender gap predicts the proportion of women in the investment profession across countries and across states in the US. Our results suggest that societal factors jointly affect the math gender gap and women’s career outcomes. Identifying and addressing these barriers could decrease the math gender gap and increase the representation of women in highly quantitative fields such as finance, which might help to reduce the gender pay gap since these fields tend to pay well.