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Abstract
Nationally, females account for less than one-third of the students in agricultural economics undergraduate programs. We identified a gender gap in test performance between genders with women in general economics and agricultural economics scoring nearly three percent lower than men. Compared to men, women also tended to be less interested in the subject. Contrary to expectations, interest in economics was not higher among women within business and economic majors when compared to women with other majors. Findings suggest the challenge of increasing women's interest in economics persists.
Keywords: agricultural economics, business, economics, gender gap, gender preferences
Introduction
Women play an important and growing role in U.S. agriculture. The percentage of farmers who are female nearly tripled, from 5% to 14%, between 1978 and 2007 (Hoppe and Korb, 2013). Women are also increasingly present in agribusiness, most recently comprising 44% of the workforce (Feedstuffs, 2013). However, the percentages of women receiving a degree in economics and agricultural economics differ considerably from general agriculture, other social science fields and certain business disciplines (Table 1). Women accounted for 28% of the bachelor's degrees in agricultural economics conferred in 2009-2010, while other social science fields saw a larger share comprised by women.
Although women's participation in economics has increased over the years, a gender gap continues. According to the National Center for Education Statistics (2012) among the almost half of the 12th graders in the U.S. completing a course in general economics, the average scale score was higher for male students than for female students. Additionally, 45% of males were at or above proficient level in economics, compared to 38% for female students. Whether this persisting gender gap is worrisome has been a subject of interest for decades; the findings remain inconclusive.
At North Dakota State University, women accounted for 11% of economics majors and 17% of agricultural economics majors during spring semester, 2012. These percentages of women's participation are small compared to the national statistics on women's share of bachelor's degrees in economics (29%) and agricultural economics (28%) reported in Table 1. Our department's lower percentage of women motivated a more detailed look at gender differences.
We tested for gender differences among students in a principles of microeconomics course at North Dakota State University. Principles of...