Pay Equity Evaluations of Occupations and Their Bases

Recent research indicates that type of occupation is a major basis for evaluating the fairness of earnings. The present paper reports the results of a research investigating which of the characteristics of occupations serve as bases of pay-equity evaluations, and whether there is a measure of consensus in regard to these bases. Major prevalent theoretical perspectives, such as equity theory and status value theory, served as bases for formulating and testing a series of hypotheses. The findings, based on a cross-sectional city sample of 222 employed individuals in Israel, show that pay-equity evaluations of occupations are based on a consensual frame of reference. The major bases of such evaluations were found to be occupational prestige and certain contributive inputs such as the amount of vocational training and the physical demands required of the incumbents' occupations.