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on Gender |
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Issue of 2026–08–17
three papers chosen by Jan Sauermann, Institutet för Arbetsmarknads- och Utbildningspolitisk Utvärdering |
| By: | Kaleem, Hira; Sakakibara, Anri; Wadho, Waqar; Siddique, Abu |
| Abstract: | Female labor force participation in LMICs remains persistently low, despite improvements in women's education, fertility, and income that would normally predict higher participation. We argue that this pattern can reflect a coordination failure sustained by miscalibrated second-order beliefs about community approval of women working outside the home. In many households, a woman's employment is determined by more than one decision-maker, and each may care about the perceived approval of both men and women in the community. Therefore, the binding misperception can lie in any of four belief cells: men's beliefs about men, men's beliefs about women, women's beliefs about men, or women's beliefs about women. We study these possibilities using novel primary survey data from more than 4, 000 low-income Pakistani households. Within households, we elicit each respondent's own support for women's work, second-order beliefs about community support, and the target woman's labor-market behavior, comparing households within the same census block. We find that support for women's work is widely underestimated, especially support among women, so communities are substantially more accepting than their members believe. The belief most strongly associated with a woman's search and work history is her own perception of other women's approval. Male household members' beliefs matter mainly for women's current employment status, consistent with their role in granting permission. The belief that appears most important is also correlated across generations along gender lines: mothers' beliefs about women predict daughters' beliefs about women. Evidence on mechanisms points most strongly to social learning about respectability rather than the anticipation of social sanctions from other women. |
| Keywords: | Women working outside the home, social norms, misperceptions, second-order beliefs, pluralistic ignorance, peer effects, Pakistan |
| JEL: | J16 J22 D13 D83 O12 Z13 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:1786 |
| By: | Park, Seonyoung (Colgate University); Simpson, Nicole (Colgate University) |
| Abstract: | Married women’s labor supply in the United States has increased only slowly since the late 1990s, while married men’s labor supply has continued to decline. This slowdown in married women’s labor supply in recent decades masks substantial heterogeneity across households. From the late 1990s to the early 2020s, married mothers (with at least one child under age 15) experienced large increases in work hours, whereas women without children (non-mothers) saw only small increases. Over the same period, married fathers reduced work hours more than their counterparts without children while increasing time devoted to childcare. To explain these changes, we develop a two-earner life-cycle model in which labor supply and fertility are endogenous and spouses’ childcare time is substitutable. Counterfactuals show that the narrowing gender wage gap is the primary driver of recent shifts: it raises mothers’ work hours and lowers fathers’ work hours, in part by reallocating childcare toward fathers and thereby expanding mothers’ capacity to work and accelerating their human capital accumulation. |
| Keywords: | married women, labor supply, gender wage gap, childcare, heterogeneity, recent trend reversal |
| JEL: | E24 J16 J22 |
| Date: | 2026–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18828 |
| By: | David Card; Ciprian Domnisoru; Seth Sanders; Lowell Taylor; Victoria Udalova |
| Abstract: | We document an enduring influence of female primary school teachers on their female students in rural America circa 1940. Using historical US Census data linked to IRS records, later censuses, and death records, we find that exposure to female teachers significantly improved girls’ educational attainment—particularly among those with poorly-educated parents and in areas with limited labor market opportunities for women. These educational gains translated into delayed marriage and childbearing, marriage matches to better-educated husbands and higher household income. We also find that exposure to female teachers increased longevity of women relative to men. |
| Keywords: | Female Teachers; Education and Gender Equality; Education and Mortality |
| Date: | 2026–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:26-39 |