Abstract
Results of our empirical specifications indicate that increasing trade openness in India’s more concentrated manufacturing industries is associated with growing residual wage gaps between male and female employees. This finding suggests that with declining rents in the concentrated sector post-liberalization, women appear to have borne the brunt of cost-cutting practices in firms’ compensation decisions. By analyzing the effects of the Indian trade liberalization on relative pay in manufacturing industries, and by providing empirical evidence that female employees appear to have fared less well as compared to their male counterparts, this study demonstrates that not everyone benefited equally as a consequence of the reforms.