Minjin Chae

PhD Candidate, Harvard University, Department of Sociology

email: minjinchae@g.harvard.edu

I study how individual decisions and behaviors regarding work and family, often perceived as voluntary and rational, are in fact deeply embedded in social structures and norms. My projects ask whether workplace flexibility shifts gendered domestic expectations, how occupational segregation produces gender and racial inequality in remote work, and how organizational configurations mediate the effects of flexibility and childcare policies. I use quantitative methods with administrative, survey, and experimental data from the United States, Germany, and South Korea.

Here’s my CV.

Publications

• Yun, Youngho, Yeani Choi, and Minjin Chae. 2021. "Development and Validity Testing of the Workplace Parentship Index (WPI): Assessment of Family-Friendly Practices." Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 63(12).

Working papers

• Chae, Minjin. "When Does Gender Trump Flexibility? Workplace Flexibility and Domestic Task Assignment." Under review.
  • Finalist, Best Student Paper Award, Organization and Management Theory Division, Academy of Management, 2026

Work in progress

• Chae, Minjin. "Activating Inequality: Task Segregation and the Racial and Gender Divide in Remote Work."
• Chae, Minjin. "When Do Firms Reduce or Reproduce Gender Inequality? Organizational Contexts of the Pandemic Work From Home and KiFöG Childcare Expansions."
  • Guest Researcher in residence, WZB Berlin Social Science Center, Spring 2026
• Chae, Minjin. "Worker Power and Temporal Rents: How Occupational Closure and Productivity Constraints Shape Schedule Control."
• Cha, Youngjoo, Kaitlin Johnson, and Minjin Chae. "It's the Hours, Not the Job: Temporal Flexibility and the Gender Wage Gap Within Occupations."
• Chae, Minjin. "Who Works From Home Within the Same Job? Racial Inequality in Remote Work and the Role of Collective Bargaining."
• Chae, Minjin. "Gender Essentialist Norms and Skeptical Attitudes Toward Marriage Among South Korean Young Adults."
  • International Conference on Sociology of Korea Student Paper Award, University of Pennsylvania Kim Center for Korean Studies, 2022
  • Best Graduate Student Paper Award, The Population Association of Korea, 2019