[Equità Di Genere] The gender pay gap in the market for visual art in Germany

1. Motivation and context

In a recent study entitled Artists’ Labour Market and Gender: Evidence from German visual artists, we test the presence of a gender pay gap in the market for visual art in Germany. While almost all related studies (e.g., Adams et al., 2017; Cameron et al., 2019; Farrell et al., 2020; Bocart et al., 2021) use auction data from the top segment of artists, as a novel feature, we examine direct earnings from different sources in a more representative sample. Including a wide range of income categories allows us to significantly reduce a potential survival bias and, therefore, to obtain more general results.

Specifically, our data comes from a self-administered survey conducted in 2016 by the Bund Bildender Ku¨nstlerinnen und Ku¨nstler (BKK, national association of visual artists, https://www.bbk-bundesverband.de/), a professional representation of free-lance visual artists in Germany [1]. Among other things, participants were asked about their income situation, education, demographics, an art form, and market performance in terms of works sold. Around 85% out of the more than 1,300 subjects in our sample declared to be recognised by tax authorities as an artist, which, in Germany, is a formal process where free artists’ work needs to be proven.

Even though the survey does not report the exact income and uses eight income categories (from zero to more than 50,000 Euros) instead, the analysis of these categories allows studying the gaps in the direct earnings of the artists, which is rarely done in the literature. A big share of related studies (like those cited above) uses auction data; hence it looks at the secondary market only, which are not always reflected in the financial status of the artists, and in many cases, can be more often interpreted as the buyer’s valuation of the art work. Auction gender gaps can still appear due to the discrimination, but only by one side of the market, whereas gaps in direct income may signal the existence of discrimination in a broader context. In this paper, we test the differences in direct income for the presence of gender discrimination.

2. Empirical approach and main results

In a first step, we note that a simple comparison of income distributions in the raw data already hints at disparities in revenues between male and female artists. In detail, compared to men, the share of female artists is always higher in the four lowest categories but lower in the three top income categories. Still, these disparities alone cannot be taken as proof for discriminating behavior in the market as there might be differences in variables associated with performance within the groups. Therefore, in our empirical analyses, we control for differences in characteristics such as education, artistic excellence, art field, and family. We find that gender remains a predictor for revenues: female artists, on average, generate fewer revenues from the art market and are underrepresented in the highest income categories. Women are also about ten percentage points less likely to remain in the highest income categories and to belong to the top category over the course of a three years span. In line with the lower revenues, we find that females sell significantly less to the art market. As a direct consequence, we can observe a higher engagement in teaching activities as well as a higher take-up of other income sources like financial support by the partner.

3. Suggestive evidence for discrimination

Applying a statistical method to decompose the payment gaps, we show that we can explain only around one-third of the gap by differences in observable characteristics, such as experience, education, art field, geographic characteristics. Because of the large unexplained part, we cannot rule out that (explicit or implicit) discrimination against female artists exists on the studied market. Discrimination could relate to gatekeepers and taste-makers in the private market, like curators, dealers, and critics, for instance. Historically, the access to education in general, and art education in particular, as well as the art market was not equal for different genders, which resulted in the stereotypical image of an artist as a white male.

Even though more females are present in the galleries nowadays, and some museums and galleries are putting additional efforts to introduce female artists of the past to the broader audience, the stereotypical image of a male artist persists. One possible explanation is the following: some curators, art dealers, museums, and other market players may decide on the safe strategy of program selection. Aiming to attract more art consumers, they choose more known artists, which are mainly males. Interestingly, we do not find gender inequalities when the public sector acts on the art market. Conditioned on artist’s characteristics, men and women in our sample are equal likely to sell to the public sector where cultural sponsorship is accompanied by transparent anti-discrimination policies and guidelines. This result hence supports the impression of discriminating behaviour in the private market. In order to close the overall gap, therefore, the actions on the private market should be a priority.

4. Ideas to narrow the gap

Exploring the payment differences in the art market deeper, we observe that the disparity is more prominent for the younger artists. When the artist is still unknown, the market is likely to set the price for their work or make a decision about the purchase based on the expected valuation. Often, the expected valuation will be determined by the average valuations and average sale volumes of the similar artists already known to the market.

With the existing gender gap in sales and prices, such behaviour will result in further persistence of the gap due to statistical discrimination. Based on these observations, a first policy implication could be subsidisation of female art (e.g., by tax allowance) on the private market to give incentives to the galleries to promote female artists and build up their careers.

Another relevant aspect is gender differences in risk-taking and competitiveness, a phenomenon well documented in labor economics and other disciplines (e.g., Bertrand, 2011; Niederle and Vesterlund, 2011; Azmat and Petrongolo, 2014; Petrongolo, 2019). In essence, females are on average less willing to tolerate risks and to enter competitive environments compared to men. These gender differences offer an explanation for job sorting. While we cannot directly observe these differences in our data, it could be another reason for why female artists do not make it into the higher income class in our sample. Without a doubt, the art market is characterised by a high degree of uncertainty about income perspective and contests for places in exhibitions, funding, and art prizes. It follows that risk tolerance and the willingness to compete are needed for the decision to become a full-time artist, and the differences in preferences than might explain why less females follow this path. One way to mitigate the adverse effects of risk and competition and to foster the share of females in the top segment of earnings would be to extend public art sponsorship that guarantees fixed revenues to young artists.

 

Maria Marchenko, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics.

Hendrik Sonnabend, University of Hagen, Department of Economics and Business Administration.

References

Adams, R. B., Kraeussl, R., Navone, M. A., and Verwijmeren, P. (2017). Is gender in the eye of the beholder? Identifying cultural attitudes with art auction prices. Discussion paper. https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3083500.

Azmat, G. and Petrongolo, B. (2014). Gender and the labor market: What have we learned from field and lab experiments? Labour Economics, 30:32–40.

Bertrand, M. (2011). New perspectives on gender. In Card, D. and Ashenfelter, O., editors, Handbook of Labor Economics, volume 4B, chapter 17, pages 1543–1590. Elsevier (Netherlands).

Bocart, F. Y., Gertsberg, M., and Pownall, R. A. (2021). An empirical analysis of price differences for male and female artists in the global art market. Journal of Cultural Economics, pages 1–23.

Cameron, L., Goetzmann, W. N., and Nozari, M. (2019). Art and gender: market bias or selection bias? Journal of Cultural Economics, 43(2):279–307.

Farrell, L., Fry, J. M., and Fry, T. R. (2020). Gender differences in hammer prices for Australian Indigenous art. Journal of Cultural Economics.

Niederle, M. and Vesterlund, L. (2011). Gender and competition. Annual Review of Economics, 3(1):601–630.

Petrongolo, B. (2019). The gender gap in employment and wages. Nature Human Behaviour, 3(4):316––318.

[1] Priller, E. (2016). Die wirtschaftliche und soziale Situation Bildender Ku¨nstlerinnen und Ku¨nstler 2016. Bundesverband Bildender Ku¨nstlerinnen und Ku¨nstler (BKK).

ABSTRACT

In a recent study entitled Artists’ Labour Market and Gender: Evidence from German visual artists, the authors test the presence of a gender pay gap in the market for visual art in Germany. While almost all related studies (e.g., Adams et al., 2017; Cameron et al., 2019; Farrell et al., 2020; Bocart et al., 2021) use auction data from the top segment of artists, as a novel feature, the authors examine direct earnings from different sources in a more representative sample. Including a wide range of income categories allows them to significantly reduce a potential survival bias and, therefore, to obtain more general results.