Period effects, cohort effects, and the narrowing gender wage gap

•We examine the role of period and cohort effects in closing the gender wage gap.•The narrowing of the wage gap from 1975 to 2009 is largely due to cohort effects.•Since the mid-1990s, the wage gap has continued to close absent of period effects.•Shifts in the gap for later cohorts are chiefly a result of declines in male wages.

Despite the abundance of sociological research on the gender wage gap, questions remain. In particular, the role of cohorts is under investigated. Using data from the Current Population Survey, we use age–period–cohort analysis to uniquely estimate age, period, and cohort effects on the gender wage gap. The narrowing of the gender wage gap that occurred between 1975 and 2009 is largely due to cohort effects. Since the mid-1990s, the gender wage gap has continued to close absent of period effects. While gains in female wages contributed to declines in the gender wage gap for cohorts born before 1950, for later cohorts the narrowing of the gender wage gap is primarily a result of declines in male wages.