<p>This study examines the factors that impact wage inequality using micro-data from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. We use cross-sectional data from the Labour Marker Panel Survey in Egypt, Jordan, Sudan, and Tunisia and the smoothed instrumental variables quantile regression (SIVQR) method. Our estimation technique has the advantage of being less sensitive to weak instrumental variables than the conventional IV quantile regression. Our model shows that education, overeducation, gender, employment sector, and contract type have causal effects on wage inequality. Gender is the strongest source of wage inequality and the size of the wage gap related to wages. By contrast, the lowest wage inequality exists in the return on education, which indicates that education can tackle the inequality problem. We recommend that governments in the region should adopt policies and reform institutions in the labour market to redirect wage gap trends towards eliminating them to cope with globalisation and technological challenges. Governments in MENA should work to reduce wage inequality by fighting gender discrimination and activating legal frameworks that enforce equity.</p>