Gender Norms and Income Misreporting within Households

We demonstrate that individuals’ survey responses are prone to the influence of gender norms. Drawing on Swiss and Austrian data combining survey and administrative information for the same couple, we find that couples where the woman outearns her partner misreport their incomes such that they comply with the male breadwinner norm. This introduces a systematic bias into surveyed incomes and leads to a considerable overestimation of policy relevant measures like the gender wage gap, which is frequently based on survey data. Furthermore, surveyed income information can lead to false conclusions about individuals’ labor market behaviour if taken at face value.