International Journal of Manpower

Still a wedge in the door: women training for the construction trades in the USA
Gnseli Berik Cihan Bilginsoy

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Gnseli Berik Cihan Bilginsoy, (2006),"Still a wedge in the door: women training for the construction trades
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Still a wedge in the door: women

training for the construction
trades in the USA
Gunseli Berik and Cihan Bilginsoy

Women training
for construction
in the USA
321

Department of Economics, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA

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Abstract
Purpose This paper aims to evaluate the variations in the entry and exit of women apprentices in
the USA, overall and by race/ethnicity, over the 1995-2003 period. Also aims to examine how womens
representation among new apprentices and their attrition and retention rates vary with individual,
training program, and occupational characteristics.
Design/methodology/approach An individual-level dataset from the US Department of Labor is
used to estimate econometrically womens representation in apprenticeship programs and womens
odds of completing programs.
Findings Womens representation among new trainees is very low and deteriorating. The results
confirm previous findings based on data for the early 1990s that program sponsorship has significant
impact on womens representation and retention. Women have better chances of joining the high-skill
construction workforce if they enroll in union-contractor joint programs. Joint programs feature higher
shares of women in the incoming classes and higher odds of graduation in comparison with the
unilateral contractor programs. While White women have higher completion rates than Latinas and
Black women, the union impact on shares of enrollees is the largest for Black women and the lowest for
White women.
Research limitations/implications The dataset is not nationally representative. It covers 31
states or about 65 percent of all apprentices.
Practical implications Union sponsorship is necessary but not sufficient to enhance womens
integration in the trades. Increasing participation of women in apprenticeship and the trades requires
major changes in policies, priorities, and behavior of contactors, unions, and the government to
actively recruit women and improve working conditions at the construction site.
Originality/value This is the first systematic analysis of performance of women apprentices that
utilizes the most recent data from the USA.
Keywords Apprenticeships, Training, Construction industry, Skilled workers, Women, Trade unions
Paper type Research paper

One of our worst fears is that young women will not be allowed or encouraged to enter the
trades, and those of us who remain will just move along as a lump on the demographic chart
until the end of our working careers Molly Martin, Electrician (Martin, 1997).
Those of us already in the trades see ourselves as a wedge in the door; weve got to hold the
door open so that more women can come in behind us Fran Krauss, Ironworker (Martin,
1997).
An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Eastern Economic Association Conference,
New York City, March 3-5, 2005. The authors would like to thank Allen Smith for providing the
apprenticeship data, and Shahrukh Khan, Richard Fowles, and three anonymous reviewers for
comments.

International Journal of Manpower

Vol. 27 No. 4, 2006
pp. 321-341
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0143-7720
DOI 10.1108/01437720610679197

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322

1. Introduction
Construction is one of the most male-dominated sectors in the US In 2002, women
accounted for 9 percent of the labor force in the industry, lower than any other
sector, and only a fifth of them were employed in the skilled trades (CPWR, 2002).
This characteristic has been impervious to change despite the regulatory changes of
the late 1970s designed to dismantle the barriers to womens entry to the skilled
trades. Observers of the process of gender integration in the trades have identified
persistent obstacles in access to training that interact with womens reluctance and
lack of preparedness to seek the trades as a career. This paper uses individual-level
data on registered apprenticeship for construction occupations available from 31
states to evaluate systematically the variations in the entry and exit of women
apprentices, both overall and by race/ethnicity over the 1995-2003 period. We
examine how womens representation among new apprentices and their attrition
and retention rates vary with characteristics of apprentices, training programs, and
occupations. In particular, we seek to assess whether involvement of construction
unions in organizing training has a favorable impact on both womens entry into
and completion of apprenticeship as indicated by previous research (Berik and
Bilginsoy, 2000, 2002).
While registered apprenticeship is not the sole route for acquisition of skills, or even
the major one in the USA, it is a more significant port for women. Women who have
lesser access to informal networks to establish contacts with the industry in
comparison with men are more likely to benefit from the formal structure of
apprenticeship training and its obligation to abide by explicit rules, affirmative action
requirements, and anti-discrimination regulations. Given womens miniscule numbers,
an increase in womens share in the construction trades is unlikely to be a major
strategy to reduce the gender earnings gap in the US economy or reducing poverty
rates among women. Rather, increasing womens numbers provides one escape route
from low-wage jobs (Byrd, 2001). In comparison with service and even manufacturing
occupations, the trades pay higher wages, offer portable skills, a greater degree of
autonomy, and more flexible schedules. From the contractors and owners perspective,
womens significance lies in their potential to mitigate skilled labor shortage in
construction, which is experiencing a low rate of entry of workers, high rate of attrition,
and an aging workforce. Industry spokespeople acknowledge women as the greatest
untapped source of labor.
In this study we examine the latest trends and patterns of gender integration in the
construction trades to determine whether greater numbers of women are being
recruited and trained. We focus on the ten largest trades that account for the bulk of
apprentices and use the US Department of Labor (DOL) dataset that covers apprentices
who started training during the 1995-2003 period[1]. In Sections 2 and 3 we provide the
background for the empirical analysis, focusing on the nature of training for the
construction trades and the history of gender integration in the trades and
apprenticeship in the USA, respectively. Section 4 presents discussion of the literature
on womens entry into and exit from training. The empirical analyses of womens share
in apprenticeship and their odds of graduation are presented in sections 5 and 6. We
carry out these exercises for all women as well as White and Black women and Latinas
separately. The concluding section draws the policy implications.

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2. Training for the construction trades

The construction trades are distinguished from other blue-collar jobs in that workers
self-supervise and apply their abilities under conditions that vary from one project to
another. Achievement of this level of skills requires thorough training in practical and
theoretical aspects of the occupation. Registered apprenticeship combines on-the-job
training (OJT) and in-class related theoretical instruction (RTI) within the framework
of a written curriculum. Apprentices are admitted following a basic skills examination
and interview. Graduation requires successful completion of predetermined hours of
training in specific tasks. In the USA, the majority of workers enter the construction
trades via informal training (rather than going through a registered apprenticeship
program), in which case many of them pursue their careers as semi-skilled workers. It
is possible to become a fully qualified journey worker through informal training,
provided that the worker acquires skills in all aspects of the trade and passes the
journey level exam.
A workers access to networks in the construction trades is an important
determinant of entry into training. These networks are the source of information on
when, where, and how to apply for an apprenticeship, the choice of occupation, and the
amount and type of training one is able to receive. Historically, White male workers
have had greater access to training via kin or friend, and these networks have
continued to be a key source of information in registered apprenticeship as well.
Apprenticeship programs are registered on a voluntary basis at the DOL or
DOL-recognized State Apprenticeship Councils (SAC). Registration implies that the
program agrees to abide by the DOL or SAC apprenticeship standards and
requirements, which include written state or federal entry and performance standards,
and affirmative action regulations.
Construction has historically been and still is, one of the most unionized industries
in the USA, although its union density has declined continuously, reaching 16 percent
by 2003. In unionized construction, wages and benefits in a particular craft are
determined by the collective bargaining agreement between the local trade union and
participating contractors. Contractors hire workers through the trade unions hiring
hall. Trade unions exercise significant control over the training for the trades.
Currently, around 70 percent of registered apprentices are trained in programs
sponsored jointly by the unions and contractors. The collective bargaining agreement
specifies the responsibilities and obligations of the trade union and signatory
contractors in the training process, the apprentice-journey worker ratios, and the
training wages, and a joint apprenticeship training committee oversees the program.
In the open-shop (i.e. non-union) sector, contractors vary greatly in size and so do
the labor recruitment methods. While very large and small non-union contractors
establish semi-permanent ties with workers, the majority of them hire workers through
the open market with the ebb and flow of the business cycle (Philips, 2003). High
business volatility is not conducive to establishing long-term training arrangements
such as apprenticeship. Therefore, it is not surprising that the open-shop sector trains
only about a third of the registered apprentices while it accounts for more than 80
percent of the employment. These unilateral contractor programs either involve a
group of participating contractors under the leadership of a contractor association, or a
single contractor, who determines admissions and organizes the training process.

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for construction
in the USA
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324

While apprenticeship wages are a fraction of journey-level wages, the lengthy and
multifaceted training pays off in the form of higher earnings[2]. In 2003, median hourly
earnings in the construction occupations included in this study compared very
favorably relative to overall blue collar and service sector earnings (Table I)[3]. Not
surprisingly, advocacy groups that aim to recruit women into construction highlight
the glaring earnings differential between construction trades and traditional jobs for
women, and the cumulative differential entailed over the work life of a typical worker.
They also emphasize womens entry into these non-traditional occupations as an
anti-poverty strategy, specifically as a way of achieving long-term self-sufficiency[4].

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3. Womens integration in the construction tradea

In contrast to many other industrialized countries, in the USA the governments role in
apprenticeship training is very limited. The government promotes apprenticeship
training, provides technical assistance to establish and develop programs, registers and
monitors programs, certifies graduating apprentices, and sets and enforces training
standards that include assurances of equal employment opportunity and affirmative
action (Glover and Bilginsoy, 2005). Anti-discrimination measures passed in the context
of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s facilitated the entry of Black men and helped
change the race composition of the trades workforce. The trades were opened up to
women relatively late, in the early 1970s, with a few state-level efforts, and in 1978 at the
Federal level (Glover, 1989). The legal basis of the federal policy involved amendments to
Executive Order 11278 by President Carter and the US Department of Labor regulations,
which required federal contractors and apprenticeship programs to set goals and
timetables for hiring women in the trades and apprenticeships (US Department of Labor,
1978a, b). In 1978, women constituted 3 percent of all apprentices (GAO, 1992), and their
share was less than 2 percent in the construction trades. Federal law also stipulated that
after 1980 contractors pursue best effort policies to hire women for 6.9 percent of the
labor hours in federal construction jobs (US Department of Labor, 1980).
This ambitious plan, designed not only to open up the trades for women but also to
train them so that they can qualify for these jobs, was met by strong resistance of
construction unions and contractors. Soon after its launch, the policy came to a halt
with the election of President Reagan in 1980, who mounted a vigorous attack on
Occupation

Table I.
Median hourly earnings
for all workers in ten
largest construction
trades, blue-collar jobs,
and the service sector in
2003

Bricklayer
Carpenter
Electrician
Operating engineer
Painter
Pipefitter/plumber
Roofer
Sheet metal worker
Structural steel worker
All blue-collar workers
All service workers
Source: BLS (2004)

Hourly earnings ($)

25.00
18.00
22.86
25.24
12.00
23.49
15.50
21.00
18.00
13.35
8.00

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affirmative action and undermined the policy by weakening its enforcement. While the
proportion of women among apprentices in construction more than doubled by 1983,
their share leveled off in the latter half of the 1980s, and in 1990 it stood at 4.5 percent in
the largest 10 trades (GAO, 1992). Weak enforcement became the norm in the 1980s
and 1990s, when affirmative action received hardly any push. The Office of Federal
Contract Compliance experienced sharp budget cuts and had only a small number of
inspectors to enforce the law. Not only were the odds of being inspected extremely low
for federal contractors but also those that were inspected were found to be in
substantial noncompliance with nondiscrimination requirements (Bergmann, 1996,
pp. 44, 53-54). In government-funded construction projects, contractors settled into
patterns of bringing in women apprentices and journey workers at opportune moments
in order to demonstrate compliance with regulations. Most commentators agree that
lax enforcement of the policy led to the weak results in raising the numbers of women
in construction trades (OFarrell and Moore, 1993; Eisenberg, 1998). The current state
of affairs probably is no different. A recent study by the Government Accountability
Office concluded that the Department of Labors monitoring of the apprenticeship
programs, including equal employment opportunity reviews, is very limited and
infrequent due, in part, to shortage of staff (GAO, 2005).
Despite the inertia at the federal level, there were isolated efforts to integrate women
in the trades at the state and local level (Byrd, 2001). Some were instances of
court-ordered affirmative action others were supported by state affirmative action
regulations or other programs backed by advocacy groups (Price, 2002; Worthen,
2002)[5]. In the early 2000s, advocates and local organizations in the East Coast and West
Coast and metropolitan centers such as Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, and Boston were
active in trying to provide women and minorities information about opportunities, and
prepare them for the entry requirements (Worthen and Haynes, 2003). Typically, these
groups reach out to recruit and mentor young women from vocational and regular high
schools. They also run pre-apprenticeship basic skills training for adult women to
prepare them for entry into the industry, and provide support networks[6]. These
activities received minimal support from the federal government. The Women in
Apprenticeship and Nontraditional Occupations (WANTO) Act of 1992 provided small
grants to such community-based organizations, totaling $1 million per year, through the
Womens Bureau of the DOL. In 2004, even this puny support ended with the Bush
administrations decision not to renew the WANTO funding.
Not surprisingly, the progress toward gender integration of the trades was minimal.
At the national level, womens share in the ten largest trades increased from 1 percent
to 2.4 percent over the 1989-2003 period (Figure 1), peaking at 2.6 percent in 1999 (CPS,
2003)[7]. The majority of the women employed in these trades were White[8]. The
combined shares of Black women and Latinas never exceeded 0.5 percent[9]. Thus, the
recent data indicate that women have not moved beyond being a wedge in the door in
the construction trades.
The overall share of women entering apprenticeship in these occupations remained
below 5 percent and declined precipitously after 1993 (Figure 2)[10]. The decline in the
relative share was the sharpest for White women. This drop parallels White mens
representation over the same period. However, while the increase in the Latino share
more than made up for the declining share of White men, this was not the case for
women. Black women and Latina shares each remained below 1 percent throughout the

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326

Figure 1.
Womens share in ten
largest construction trades

Figure 2.
Womens share in new
apprentice enrollments in
ten largest construction
trades

period and exhibited a declining trend. Extremely low representation of women in

apprenticeship underscores that the policy goal of womens integration in the trades is
nowhere close to being achieved. Even if the diminishing numbers of White women
primarily reflect the changing ethnic/racial composition of the apprentice workforce,
the fact remains that without renewed emphasis on enforcement of affirmative action,

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in the near future, following the retirement of the current cohort of tradeswomen, the
construction trades may revert to their pre-1970s state of being exclusive male
occupations[11].
4. The process of womens entry and exit: the literature
The literature suggests a variety of explanations for the low representation of women
among workers training for the trades. Supply-side theories emphasize the preferences of
young women and their lesser abilities in physical labor compared to men (Polachek,
1981) and the gender socialization that shapes these preferences and abilities (Blau et al.,
2002). Other explanations focus on discrimination within the trades. Statistical or error
discrimination theory (Phelps, 1972) would emphasize contractor skepticism about taking
on women apprentices for on-the-job training based on their expected lower productivity.
According to Becker (1971), discriminatory tastes of coworkers, institutionalized in the
form of exclusionary practices of unions, shuts women out of apprenticeship training. Yet
others argue that unions keep out women from training as a rational response to the
hierarchical wage structures of the labor market (Williams and Kenison, 1996) and
thereby help men maintain power over women in society (Hartmann, 1976).
This study does not attempt to evaluate the relative importance of these competing
hypotheses mainly because of the lack of information on the supply of apprentices. We
do not have data on the number or characteristics of women who apply for
apprenticeship and those who are turned down, and how these compare with the male
applicants. Instead, our goal here is limited to assessing the contribution of a number of
apprentice, training program, occupation, and labor market characteristics to womens
performance in formal training.
We focus on the entry and departure stages of the training process. In the analysis
of entry, program type union-contractor joint or unilateral contractor is a key
variable since the decision to accept new apprentices is made by the program sponsors.
The behavior of sponsors may take the form of either neglect of/discrimination against
women or efforts to reach out and recruit women, including organizing
pre-apprenticeship programs that provide basic skills prior to the admission exams.
Current research on the construction industry documents the culture of the industry as
a major barrier for womens success, whether as tradeswomen or professionals
(Eisenberg, 1998; Whittock, 2000; Bagilhole et al., 2000). The weight of historical
evidence documents the obstacles set by unions in the path of women who seek to train
for the trades (Hartmann, 1976; Milkman, 1990).
There are no comparable accounts of the experiences of women in the open-shop
sector. One recent statistical study examines how unions fare compared to non-union
settings in apprenticeship and finds that womens chances of enrollment as registered
apprentices were far greater if unions were involved in the organization and
administration of training, and that the result held equally strongly for White women,
Black women, and Latinas (Berik and Bilginsoy, 2002). This union effect may be due
to either the less discriminatory admissions process ensured by the collective
bargaining institutions or the greater susceptibility of joint union-contractor programs
to pressure from advocacy groups seeking to increase the number of women and
racial/ethnic minority apprentices. Either of their own accord or under pressure from
these community organizations unions may take a more active role in recruiting and
preparing candidates for apprenticeship.

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328

The second issue of interest is the substitutability among various minority groups.
Specifically, the affirmative action requirement may lead to the unintended
consequence of Black women or Latinas fulfilling the double minority role, helping
the contractor meet the goal of hiring a woman and a racial/ethnic minority through a
single hire. In this case, Black women or Latinas may displace White women or
minority men. Alternatively, if women or racial/ethnic minorities are bona fide
apprentices, then synergies may be observed whereby increase in one groups share
could have a positive effect on another group.
The second stage in training is the departure phase. Performance at this stage can
be gauged by the likelihood of completing the training program or dropping out of
training. One could reasonably expect that, once in the training program, White males
will continue to reap the advantages of being better connected to networks of
tradesmen and therefore get training jobs and complete requirements of training. The
quality and quantity of information the apprentice has about the occupation, industry,
and the conditions of work prior to entry into apprenticeship may affect the decision to
quit or continue training. If this information is not distributed uniformly across various
groups, then the attrition and retention rates will vary accordingly. Women
apprentices, who are less likely to have taken shop classes at high school, used tools,
worked as laborers at a construction site, or received counsel from industry insiders
may discover that the occupation is not to their liking and decide to quit. Women
apprentices have, at best, tenuous connections to the networks of father-son/nephew
relationships characteristic of construction trades[12]. The traditionally male culture of
construction also makes the training worksite a hostile environment for women. Oral
histories of women in construction document the routine exclusion, harassment,
denigration, and endangerment by male co-workers (Eisenberg, 1998; Martin, 1997;
Schroedel, 1985).
Race/ethnicity can add another layer to the obstacles women apprentices face.
There is evidence that, in general, racially-defined communities play a significant role
in the distribution of jobs (Williams, 2002). Bates and Howell (1997) show that among
construction contractors in New York City the White informal networks in the industry
work to advantage White women and disadvantage Black men. Interview-generated
data suggest that a similar process is also at work among apprentices and journey
workers in the industry. Moreover, Black women reportedly experience tougher and
more dangerous conditions of training (Eisenberg, 1998). They are treated with greater
disrespect and subjected to slurs that are chilly reminders of the segregation history of
the USA. While their double-minority status may help them secure entry into training,
it is likely that fewer survive the heavier, drudge work, or more routine tasks that they
get stuck with during training[13]. Under these conditions one might expect Black
women and Latinas to have lower completion rates and higher drop out rates compared
to White women. This expectation is also supported by the conclusions of Berik and
Bilginsoy (2000), who find that being a racial/ethnic minority adversely affects the
training outcomes of both women and men apprentices.
5. The data
The analysis makes use of the Registered Apprenticeship Information System (RAIS)
database of the Office of Apprenticeship Training and Employer and Labor Services
(OATELS) of the Department of Labor. The RAIS database is a compilation of

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apprenticeship registrations as reported by the local program sponsors and it includes

all apprentices in thirty states who started training during the 1995-2003 period[14].
The remaining states do not fully report to the OATELS and, with the exception of
California, they are excluded from this study. The California data were obtained
separately and appended to the RAIS in this study[15]. OATELS estimates that 30
states account for about 50 percent of all apprentices in the US The California data
represent another 15 percent of apprentices. Since most of the states not included in the
RAIS have higher rates of unionization and stronger union involvement in training
than the included states, the union-contractor programs are likely to be
underrepresented in the RAIS dataset.
Between 1995 and 2003, 393,933 new apprentices, or 56 percent of the total number
of apprentices, entered apprenticeship in the ten largest trades (Table II). Less than 4
percent of these apprentices were women. Two occupations, operating engineer and
painting trades, stood out with their high representation of women[16]. Most of the
women apprentices were White, followed by Black women and Latinas. Among
carpenters the shares of Black women and Latinas were also higher than their average
shares.
Table III summarizes the performance of apprentices who enrolled in 1995, 1996 and
1997 (which we will refer to as the classes of 1995, 1996, and 1997). The selection of
earlier classes is expected to generate the most comprehensive information on attrition

Bricklayer
Carpenter
Electrician
Operating engineer
Painter
Pipefitter
Plumber
Roofer
Sheet metal
Structural steel
Total

Apprentices

% Women

% White women

% Black women

% Latina

14,246
87,820
118,720
13,968
17,210
21,922
39,597
29,123
24,231
27,096
393,933

1.6
4.9
3.3
14.4
6.7
2.8
2.0
1.6
2.2
2.5
3.7

0.9
2.4
2.5
10.9
4.2
2.2
1.5
0.7
1.5
1.7
2.4

0.5
1.4
0.5
1.6
1.5
0.3
0.3
0.6
0.4
0.4
0.7

0.2
0.7
0.3
0.8
0.8
0.2
0.1
0.3
0.2
0.2
0.4

Source: OATELS of RAIS

White male
White female
Black male
Black female
Latino
Latina
Total

% Completed

% Dropped out

38,249
1,879
5,230
578
6,583
198
52,717

41.7
33.6
25.3
17.7
32.2
25.3
38.3

55.0
63.3
71.4
75.6
64.3
69.2
58.4

Source: OATELS of RAIS.

Notes: Outcomes for apprentices enrolled in 6,000- and 8,000-OJT-hour programs in 1995, 1996, 1997

Women training
for construction
in the USA
329

Table II.
Occupational distribution
of women apprentices
enrolled (1995-2003)

Table III.
Training outcomes by
gender and race/ethnicity
in 2003

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and retention in training. For purposes of comparability, the sample is further limited
to programs with 6,000- and 8,000-hour OJT requirement (usually referred as 3- and
4-year programs, respectively, under the standard assumption of 2,000 hours of
employment per year), which accounted for 70 percent of apprentices[17]. As of the end
of 2003, the last date for which data are available, a minimum of six years had lapsed
for these classes of apprentices. We excluded from the sample apprentices who
received OJT or RTI credit for earlier work in their trade or relevant course work in
order to focus on comparable apprentices.
Table III shows that, overall, the completion rate was less than 40 percent but there
were significant variations across race and gender groups. Men had higher completion
rates than women, and Whites had higher completion rates than Blacks or Latinos.
Among Blacks and Latinos, over half the enrollees dropped out of training and only
one quarter to one third of each group graduated to journey-level status. White
womens status was more favorable relative to Black men and comparable to Latinos.
Taken together, Tables II and III suggest that the low percentage of women in the
construction trades is the result of both continued lower rates of entry and lower rates
of graduation from apprenticeship training.
6. Econometric analysis
A. Womens entry into apprenticeship
This section presents an econometric examination of the relationship between womens
share in apprenticeship and the apprenticeship program and occupation characteristics.
The unit of observation is program-occupation-year[18]. The dependent variable is the
share of women among the newly enrolled apprentices each year in each
program-occupation over the 1995-2003 period. There were 21,119 such observations.
When the dependent variable is a proportion, estimation is commonly carried out in
terms of its log-odds ratio, accompanied by some ad hoc adjustment for the observations
that equal zero or one (e.g. dropping them). This transformation is seriously flawed when
there are a large number of observations where the dependent variable takes on extreme
values. In our sample, the share of women is equal to zero in more than 45 percent of the
observations (weighted by the number of apprentices). Therefore, we adopt an
alternative generalized least-squares method proposed by Papke and Wooldridge (1996)
that does not require log-odds transformation or ad hoc adjustments. This method
(commonly known as fractional logit or flogit) models the conditional expected value of
the dependent variable as a logistic function and fits the generalized linear model using
maximum quasi-likelihood estimation. In applying this procedure we weighted each
observation by the number of apprentices. We also clustered observations by the
program-occupation on the grounds that observations from the same
program-occupation over several years are not independent. There are a total of 6,552
clusters. We ran four regressions in which the dependent variables are shares of all
women, White women, Black women, or Latinas[19].
Explanatory variables include program sponsorship type, term length of the training
program and its size, and the state unemployment rate in the year of entry. In order to
assess the displacement effects, we also included the shares of competing groups as
independent variables. Thus, for the sample of all women, the competing group is men of
color; for White women the competing groups are men of color, Black women, and
Latinas; and so forth. Program sponsor is a dummy variable, which takes the value of 1

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for union-management joint, and 0 for unilateral employer programs. If women are more
likely to have greater family responsibilities, they are expected to choose shorter training
programs than men. Term length of the program is measured by the required OJT hours
for completion of training, measured in 1,000-hour units. Affirmative action regulations
are likely to influence admission decisions in larger programs because only the programs
with more than five apprentices are bound by affirmative action regulations. In the
absence of information on the total number of apprentices in each program in a given
year, we use the number of apprentices entering training in each year (measured in units
of ten) as a proxy for the effect of affirmative action[20].
Previous studies that considered a larger number occupations, including those in
the service and public administration sectors, found that women are concentrated in
lower paying trades (GAO, 1992; Berik and Bilginsoy, 2002). We checked whether this
still holds in the narrower set of construction trades considered here. We included the
statewide 75th percentile wage in the trade relative to the statewide laborer wage in
year 2000. In order to measure the impact of labor market conditions, we include the
unemployment rate in the apprentices state in his/her year of enrollment. As a general
measure of womens labor supply, womens share of the labor force in the apprentices
state in the year of her entry into training is introduced. Additional control variables
are occupation, region (East, North, South, West, following the standard US Population
Census categorization) and entry year dummies[21].
The first result that follows from Table IV is that, consistent with previous findings,
union-contractor joint sponsorship has a strong positive impact on the share of women.
Using the estimated coefficients of Table IV, the marginal effects can be calculated as a
logistic function. Accordingly, the probability of an apprentice being a woman is 3.1
and 2.0 percent in the joint and non-joint programs, respectively[22]. Thus, the
likelihood that an apprentice is female is more than 50 percent higher in joint
programs. While union sponsorship affects womens representation positively for each
group, the impact is the highest for Black women (by 83 percent) and the lowest for
White women (by 44 percent). Contrary to expectations, larger programs have a lower
share of women. The magnitude of the marginal impact, however, is very small. The
odds that an apprentice is woman decline by one percent if the program size increases
by ten apprentices. The relative wage has opposite effects on White womens and
Black women/Latinas shares. White womens share is inversely related to the relative
wage. One standard deviation increase in relative wage lowers the odds that an
apprentice is a White woman by 11 percent but raises the odds of a Black woman or
Latina apprentice by 38 and 26 percent, respectively. Thus, among the occupations
considered here, the conventional wisdom that women are concentrated in lower wage
occupations applies only to White women.
Increase in the share of women of one racial/ethnic group does not come at the
expense of another group. In fact, share of women of one group is positively related to
the shares of other groups of women. This result suggests that the double-minority
women (Latinas or Black women) do not displace White women, and that either the
programs tend to draw from all groups of women or the presence of one race/ethnic
group of women tends to attract other women. Moreover, a higher share of ethnic/racial
minority men is directly related to the shares of Black women and Latinas in the
programs (but not to the share of White women).

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All Women
Program sponsor
Program size

332

Term length
Relative wage

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Unemployment rate
Program share of:
Male racial minority

White

Black

Latina

0.452 * * *
(0.122)
2 0.012 * * *
(0.003)
0.005
(0.040)
0.082
(0.157)
0.008
(0.033)

0.372 * * *
(0.105)
20.011 * * *
(0.003)
0.057
(0.039)
20.284 * *
(0.118)
0.057
(0.040)

0.611 * * *
(0.166)
2 0.010 * * *
(0.003)
2 0.052
(0.052)
0.808 * * *
(0.235)
0.004
(0.045)

0.419 *
(0.237)
2 0.009 * * *
(0.002)
2 0.033
(0.061)
0.569 * *
(0.243)
2 0.243 * * *
(0.062)

2 0.295
(0.193)

21.318 * * *
(0.217)

1.985 * * *
(0.282)
3.584 * * *
(0.348)

0.829 * * *
(0.302)
4.206 * * *
(0.387)
4.658 * * *
(0.917)

White women
4.288 * * *
(0.495)
4.996 * * *
(0.871)

Black women
Latina
State labor force share of:
Women

5.183 * * *
(1.119)

3.057
(2.076)

White women

1.345 * *
(0.641)
14.341 * * *
(1.246)

Black women

9.614 * * *
(1.420)

Latina

Table IV.
Womens share of newly
enrolled apprentices,
1995-2003, general linear
model (GLM) estimates

Log 2 likelihood
242,292
n (apprentices)
390,639
n (occup. 2 program-year)
21,119
Program 2 occupation clusters
6,552

2 33,198

212,759

2 7,328

Notes: Region, entry year, and occupation dummies are included in all regressions but the results are
not reported. * * *, * *, and * refer to statistical significance at the 1, 5, and 10 percent levels

As expected, womens share in training programs rises with their overall labor force
share in the state. This effect is particularly strong for Black women and Latinas. The
business cycle (the unemployment rate in the state), on the other hand, does not make a
difference in womens odds of entry into apprenticeship, except for the Latinas. The
Latina share varies procyclically.
Results reported in Table IV do not give any clues as to why womens share of
apprentices dropped from 4.5 percent in 1995 to 2.8 percent in 2003 (Figure 2). In terms
of magnitude, the only candidate among the explanatory variables that could possibly
explain the drop in womens share is the program type. But womens share declined in
both the joint and the unilateral programs in a parallel fashion, by 1.7 and 1.5
percentage points, respectively. Thus, the factor(s) that reduced womens
representation appears to affect joint and non-joint sectors equally.

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B. Attrition and retention rates

The factors that affect completion and cancellation rates are analyzed by means of two
logistic regressions[23]. The first regression estimates the impact of individual, training
program, occupation, and macroeconomic variables on the probability of completing
apprenticeship training as of the last day of data collection (December 31, 2003). The
alternative to completion is non-completion, which may be either cancellation of the
apprenticeship prior to the last day of data collection or continuation of training. The
dependent variable of the second regression, on the other hand, is the likelihood of
cancellation, as opposed to non-cancellation (i.e. completion or being still in training).
This analysis seeks to determine how race/ethnicity and gender differences
simultaneously shape the training outcomes, which renders the six race/ethnicity and
gender combinations as the main explanatory variables of interest. Independent
variables also include three apprentice characteristics: the age of the apprentice at
entry, education level (1 if either high school graduate or GED, and zero if less than 12
years of schooling), and veteran status. In addition, the variables used in the analysis of
entry into apprenticeship are introduced with minor redefinitions. The term length is
now a binary variable, taking the value of 1 for 8,000 OJT-hour and zero for 6,000-hour
programs. The unemployment rate is measured as the average state unemployment
rate over the duration of training for each apprentice based on the assumption that
labor market conditions exert an ongoing effect on participation in training. Other
variables are defined the same as in the analysis of womens entry.
The reported odds ratios in Table V show that the probabilities of completion and
cancellation vary substantially across the race/ethnicity and gender categories. Compared
to the White male reference group, all other groups have lower odds of completing
training, except for Latinos. Four race/ethnic and gender categories with statistically
distinct probabilities of completion can be identified. After the Latinos, White men have
the most favorable odds of completion (12 percent lower)[24]. The third group includes
White women, Black men, and Latinas whose odds are statistically equal (and 40 to 50
percent lower than White men). In the fourth place are Black women. It should be noted
that the results on Latinas and Black women lack precision due to small cell sizes.
Union involvement in the organization of apprenticeship training significantly
improves apprentices chances of completing training. Apprentices who are registered
in union-contractor programs are almost three times more likely to complete whereas
those in unilateral contractor programs are, symmetrically, more likely to cancel[25]. A
larger program size, surprisingly (and similar to the entry results), reduces womens
likelihood of completion and raises their likelihood of cancellation. Neither the
regulatory environment nor the positive externalities experienced in the larger
programs seem to improve womens chances of completion.
Given the large impact of program sponsorship on the odds of completion and
cancellation, we inquire further into whether this effect varies across groups. For this
purpose, we estimated a new set of regressions that includes the interactions of
race/ethnic and gender group and program sponsorship in addition to the variables in
Table V. Table VI reports the estimated odds of completion and cancellation of each
race/ethnic and gender category by program sponsor type. The reference group in
these regressions is White men in contractor-only programs.
On the whole, the results reported in Table VI are consistent with those in Table V.
White men and Latinos are most likely to complete and least likely to cancel training in

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Table V.
Estimated odds ratios of
completion and
cancellation of training:
logistic regression results

Completion
Odds ratio
95% CI
Race-gender group a
Black men
Latinos
White women
Black women
Latinas
Program variables
Program sponsorb
Size of program
8,000-hour OJT
Individual variables
Age
Education
Veteran
Occupation variable
Relative wage (state)
Macro variable
Unemployment rate (state)
Log-likelihood
Number exitedc

0.54 * *
1.12 * *
0.60 * *
0.31 * *
0.51 * *

0.50-0.58
1.05-1.20
0.54-0.66
0.25-0.38
0.36-0.72

1.80 * *
0.92 *
1.63 * *
2.49 * *
1.72 * *

1.67-1.91
0.87-0.98
1.47-1.81
2.04-3.04
1.24-2.38

2.72 * *
0.99 * *
0.84 * *

2.57-2.86
0.99-1.00
0.78-0.90

0.42 * *
1.00 * *
1.14 * *

0.40-0.45
1.00-1.01
1.06-1.22

1.01 * *
1.08 *
0.92 * *

1.00-1.01
1.01-1.14
0.86-0.98

0.99 * *
0.90 * *
1.15 * *

0.99-1.00
0.84-0.96
1.08-1.23

2.73

2.53-2.93

0.36 * *

0.34-0.39

0.51
2 30,854
20,173

0.50-0.53

1.74 * *
232,658
30,782

1.69-1.80

Source: OATELS of RAIS.

Notes: * *, and * refer to statistical significance at the 1 and 5 percent levels. The sample includes
apprentices in the 6,000- and 8,000-hour OJT programs. The regressions include region, occupation, and
entry year controls but the results are not reported. a Reference group: White men b Control:
Contractor-only programs. c Total n = 52,717, which includes 1,762 apprentices who are still in training

Unilateral programs
Odds ratio
95% CI

Table VI.
Estimated odds ratios of
completion and
cancellation for
race-ethnicity and gender
groups by program
sponsor type

Cancellation
Odds ratio
95% CI

Completion regression
White men
1.00
Black men
0.65 * * *
Latinos
1.39 * * *
White women
0.49 * * *
Black women
0.39 * * *
Latinas
0.50
Log-likelihood
-30,838
Cancellation regression
White men
1.00
Black men
1.54 * * *
Latinos
0.78 * * *
White women
1.95 * * *
Black women
2.02 * *
Latinas
1.34
Log-likelihood
232,009

Union-contractor programs
Odds ratio
95% CI

0.56-0.75
1.24-1.55
0.37-0.65
0.20-0.78
0.20-1.25

2.86 * * *
1.44 * *8
2.91 * *8
1.75 * *8
0.84
1.44 *

2.70-3.03
1.31-1.58
2.66-3.17
1.55-1.98
0.66-1.07
0.99-2.10

1.35-1.76
0.70-0.86
1.50-2.54
1.14-3.58
0.63-2.87

0.40
0.76 * * *
0.41 * * *
0.64 * * *
1.05
0.74

0.38-0.43
0.70-0.84
0.37-0.44
0.57-0.72
0.84-1.30
0.52-1.06

Note: * * *, * *, and * refer to statistical significance at the 1, 5, and 10 percent levels

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both types of programs. Black women, by contrast, have the highest odds of
cancellation and the lowest odds of completion. In addition to this general pattern,
however, there are several new noteworthy results. First, compared to White men in
unilateral contractor programs, Black men and White women training in
union-contractor joint programs are more likely to complete training. These findings
are statistically highly significant ( p , 0.01). Completion probabilities of Black
Women and Latinas in union-contractor programs are statistically the same as White
men in contractor-only programs, albeit these estimated odds lack precision due to
small cell sizes.
Secondly, compared to their counterparts in contractor-only programs, Black men
and Latinos in union-contractor joint programs are more than twice as likely to
complete training. For White women this differential is more than three times as large.
In the case of Black women and Latinas, we observe that the likelihood of completion is
two to three times as high, but these are not statistically significant. Thus, it appears
that union involvement in training raises the probability of completion across the
board for all groups of apprentices.
Within each program sponsor type, however, significant differences among
race/ethnic and gender groups remain. In union-contractor joint programs, for instance,
Latinos and White men have the highest odds of completion, followed by White women
and Black men, each with statistically distinct odds of completion. Likewise, in
unilateral contractor programs, White men and Latinos have substantially higher odds
of completion.
The odds of cancellation mirror these findings. Black men, Latinos and White
women in union-contractor joint programs are significantly less likely to cancel
training in comparison with both their peers and White men in contractor-only
programs. Within each sponsor type, the ranking of odds of cancellation indicates the
favorable position of Latino and White male apprentices.
7. Conclusion
The high hopes of the 1970s for gender integration of the construction trades in the US
have not been realized. Women constitute a very small minority of apprentices relative
to their overall share in the labor force. Moreover, the share of White women
apprentices has declined since 1993. This trend reflects an overall decline in the share
of Whites and the changing ethnic composition of the construction workforce.
However, while there was a substantial inflow of Latinos, the number of minority
women did not increase commensurately. Consequently, the overall share of women
among apprentices shrank. This does not bode well for the future.
This study shows that the low share of women is due to both their low
representation in the inflow of trainees into the registered apprenticeship programs
and their low retention rates after they start apprenticeship. Some factors enhance
womens prospects. Union-contractor joint programs feature higher shares of women
in the incoming classes and higher odds of graduation in comparison with the
unilateral contractor programs. Yet the numbers of women in joint programs are so
small that exporting successful practices of such programs to unilateral contractor
programs seems hardly adequate to raise substantially the number of women in the
trades. Thus, increasing the participation of women in apprenticeship and the trades
workforce calls for major changes in policies, priorities, and behavior of contractors,

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unions, and the government at all levels. It is necessary to strive harder to recruit
women, make the construction site safe and sanitary, stop abuse and harassment, and
improve mentoring. Recruitment efforts should be implemented on a much larger scale
in order to reach current high school students, and pre-apprenticeship programs should
be expanded to deliver basic skills to high school graduates who lack them.
The potential importance of women in the trades is increasingly recognized in both
the organized and open-shop sectors of the industry in the context of the skilled
construction worker shortage, and news about women in trades appear regularly in
construction trade journals (e.g. Post, 2003; Bacon, 2005). The Building and
Construction Trades Department of the AFL-CIO formed the Committee of Women in
the Trades in February 2005, as one of its only six permanent committees, to promote
recruitment, retention and leadership advancement of women. In the open-shop sector,
there are no such formal initiatives, but the contractor and owner think-tanks also
affirm women as the greatest untapped source of skilled labor (Schleifer, 2002). The
structure of the construction industry warrants caution about these laudable
sentiments because implementation takes place at the local level. On the union side,
training and hiring decisions are made by the locals, which exercise a great deal of
autonomy and do not necessarily share the objectives or enthusiasm of the national
organization. The task is even harder in the open-shop sector characterized by a
multitude of small establishments. While the trade press reports frequently the efforts
of certain open-shop firms, such as BE&K of Alabama and Cianpro of Maine to raise
the prominence of tradeswomen, these are examples of a few very large firms willing to
allocate resources to improve womens representation. It is doubtful that these
voluntary efforts can build a critical mass of tradeswomen. Furthermore, the open-shop
sector traditionally puts less emphasis on apprenticeship and more on informal
methods of training that are less conducive to womens entry.
Efforts of unions and contractors should be complemented by federal governments
enforcement of affirmative action policies and assistance to local community-based
organizations that recruit and support women in apprenticeship. While trades offer a
route to self-sufficiency for low-income women, under the present conditions
apprenticeship or pre- apprenticeship training is not a feasible option for many of them,
particularly those who are at high risk for falling into welfare. A 3- to 4-year
apprenticeship is a costly proposition for an individual trainee, given the
training-associated costs of transportation, childcare, and in-class instruction, even if
on-the-job training during apprenticeship provides an income. Programs that remove
these obstacles would not only help increase womens share in apprenticeship but also
reduce womens poverty.
Another disconcerting trend is the decline in the share of the union sector. Relatively
better performance of the union sector in attracting and retaining women workers is
attributable, in part, to the presence of collective bargaining institutions that give voice
to non-traditional workers. With the continued decline in union density these
instruments will be blunted and womens representation in the trades will deteriorate
further. Currently, there are attempts by Congress and the Administration to repeal or
suspend the federal Davis-Bacon Act, which stipulates that contractors pay prevailing
wages in government-funded construction contracts. State level prevailing wage laws
are also under attack in several states. These laws prevent contractors from competing
for contracts on the basis of wages. Their repeal would disadvantage union contractors

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in federal contract bids and weaken unions further with disastrous consequences for
training. There is evidence that the state prevailing wage laws have positive effect on
apprenticeship recruitment and completion rates (Bilginsoy, 2005). Without a sea
change in the current priorities of the federal government regarding affirmative action,
funding local advocacy groups, and union labor, it is hard to be hopeful about the
future of womens integration in the trades.
This study also underscores that efforts to recruit and retain women in
apprenticeship should be ethnicity- and race-sensitive. It is encouraging to observe
some synergy in the entry of women of different ethnic/racial groups. This suggests
that the few who registered were accepted as bona fide apprentices and not as tokens.
Experiences of White women, Black women, and Latinas are not the same, however.
White women have higher retention rates than Latinas and Black women, which
confirms Eisenbergs observations on training conditions by race (Eisenberg, 1998).
Future research could replicate this study as data from additional states are
obtained. Inclusion of more states would increase the precision of inference about
national level patterns. Another promising avenue of research is to study the variations
in womens share in the trades across states and by trade. Trade journals report, for
example, that Maine, Washington, Oregon, New York, and California are more
successful in raising womens share in construction (Post, 2003). Similarly, data
presented in this paper show that the operating engineer apprenticeship programs
stand out in womens enrollments. Case studies of successful gender integration in
apprenticeship would provide insights on how obstacles were overcome and facilitate
reaching more definitive conclusions and policy recommendations.
Notes
1. The ten largest occupations, ranked in terms of the number of apprentices, are electricians,
carpenters, plumbers, roofers, structural steel workers, sheet metal workers, pipefitters,
painters, bricklayers, and operating engineers. This ranking is similar to the ranking of
tradespeople in these occupations (CPS, 2004).
2. Apprenticeship wages start around 50 percent of journey worker wages in the first year and
reach as high as 90 percent near the completion of training.
3. The earnings reported in Table I include union and non-union workers as well as
semi-skilled, informally trained workers and skilled journey workers. Therefore they are
likely to understate the earnings of journey-level workers trained through registered
apprenticeship.
4. See for example www.chicagowomenintrades.org (accessed March 16, 2005), www.
sixstrategies.org (accessed March 16, 2005), and Negrey et al. (2001).
5. Some legal resolutions took years to bear fruit. For example, Worthen (2002) reports that
three Chicago apprenticeship programs (electricians, pipefitters, plumbers) were brought
under consent decrees in the mid-1980s and early 1990s as settlements to discrimination
lawsuits that were filed in the mid-1970s, early 1980s.
6. For example, Chicago Women in the Trades (www.chicagowomenintrades.org),
Tradeswomen Now and Tomorrow (www.tradeswomennow.org).
7. The occupational classification in the CPS data reflects self-reporting of occupation and does
not necessarily indicate graduation from registered apprenticeship.
8. This study delineates three ethnic/racial groups: non-Hispanic Whites, Latinos who are
White, and Blacks. We included the very few Black Latinos among Blacks.

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9. Among men, over the same period, the share of Blacks remained around 5-6 percent. The
Latino share increased from 7.4 percent to 19.8 percent, which most likely reflects the Latino
immigration trends into the USA. In contrast, non-Hispanic White males dominance in the
trades declined from 83.4 percent to 68 percent (CPS, 2003).
10. Since data from California are not available for the 1989-1994 period, we excluded California
in Figure 2. The characteristics of the data used in this study are discussed in section 5
below.
11. In contrast to the decline of the female share among apprentices in the trades, there appears
to be a Latinization of both apprentices and the trades. 1990s. By 2003, they were
overrepresented in the apprenticeship programs and construction industry relative to their
share in the labor force, while Black men were slightly underrepresented (CPWR, 2002;
Bilginsoy, 2005).
12. Advocacy groups that help women and racial/ethnic minorities enter the construction trades
attempt to serve as alternatives to these traditional White male social networks.
13. The larger literature on low-skill occupations (that is, jobs that require a high school
diploma or less) also suggests that White women fare better relative to Black women in
gaining access to jobs. Jobs are more likely to go to White women even if they have fewer
years of schooling than Black women (Holzer, 1996) and that White employers stereotypes
of Black women account for their poorer prospects (Browne and Kennelly, 1999).
14. The dataset for the 1989-1995 period is the AIMS (Apprenticeship Information Management
System) compiled by the Bureau of Apprenticeship Training (BAT) of the Department of
Labor. The RAIS is reportedly cleaner and includes information on the education level of
apprentices in addition to the variables in the AIMS.
15. The RAIS does not report data for the following states: California, Connecticut, District of
Columbia, Delaware, Hawaii, Louisiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland,
Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New York, Oregon, Rhode
Island, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin.
16. The high share of women (and minorities) among operating engineers is attributed to union
locals active outreach efforts in response to lawsuits by civil rights groups (Mangum and
Walsh, 1994, p.140). According to our data, womens completion rate is also the highest in the
operating engineer occupation.
17. Programs in five occupations (carpenter, electrician, pipe fitter, plumber and sheet metal
worker) predominantly have 8,000-hour OJT requirement, while the other five have mostly
6,000-hour requirement.
18. We identify program-occupations rather than simply programs because some programs
offer training in more than one occupation.
19. We also considered the fixed-effect version of the model to account for the unobserved
characteristics of program-occupation but implementation of this model was not
computationally feasible.
20. Annual inflow of apprentices may not be a good proxy for the program size (i.e. the stock of
apprentices). An alternative binary variable distinguishing programs with more or less than
five apprentices may be more appropriate, but again the lack of stock figures is a problem.
21. Correlations among the right-hand-side variables in both this and the next section are
negligible.
22. In calculating probabilities, and the associated marginal effects and odds-ratios, we assumed
that the apprentice is an electrician in the class of 1995, located in the East, and all
continuous variables are at their mean values.

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23. The AIMS and RAIS datasets refer to the departure of an apprentice from the apprenticeship
program as cancellation. Our inspection of the AIMS database for 1989-1995 showed that
in the overwhelming majority of cancellation cases (97 percent) the apprentice chose to quit
apprenticeship while in the remainder the departure was involuntary (e.g. failure to pass a
drug test, death, or disciplinary action). The RAIS dataset does not identify the reasons for
cancellation or allow us to exclude these involuntary cases of cancellation. Hence we refrain
from referring to cancellation as the drop-out outcome.
24. Further testing shows that California apprentices drive the result regarding the Latinos.
Once the California apprentices are removed from the sample, exit probabilities of White
males and Latinos are statistically indistinguishable. Other results on completion and
cancellation are not affected when California apprentices are excluded.
25. This estimate may be subject to selection bias due to unobserved characteristics of
apprentices. If women who are more motivated and prepared chose union programs, or if
union programs select such women from the applicant pool, then the reported confidence
intervals reflect not only the program but also individual characteristics. This recognition
should not detract from the strength of the union results, however, because selectivity raises
the question of why women would prefer union over non-union programs. Union
characteristics may ultimately determine womens choice of training in joint programs.

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About the authors
Gunseli Berik is an Associate Professor of Economics and Gender Studies at the University of
Utah in the USA. Her research and teaching is in the fields of economic development, feminist
economics, gender and development, feminist theory and methodology, and the economics of
race, class and gender issues in the US Her recent research focuses on trade liberalization, labor
standards and gender wage inequality in Asia. She is currently an associate editor of Feminist
Economics.
Cihan Bilginsoy is Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City.
Gunseli Berik can be contacted at: berik@economics.utah.edu

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