Does connectivity reduce gender gaps in off‐farm employment? Evidence from 12 low‐ and middle‐income countries

Abstract

Gender gaps in labor force participation in developing countries persist despite income growth or structural change. We assess this persistence across economic geographies within countries, focusing on youth employment in off‐farm wage jobs. We combine household survey data from 12 developing countries with geospatial data on population density. The gender gap increases with connectivity from rural to peri‐urban areas and disappears in high‐density urban areas. In non‐rural areas, child dependency does not constrain young women, and secondary education improves their access to off‐farm jobs. The gender gap persists for married young women independent of connectivity improvements, indicating social norm constraints.

Opportunity, necessity, and no one in the middle: A closer look at small, rural, and female‐led entrepreneurship in the United States

“…Thus, even for women, we expect labor supply and demand factors may drive the relationship. Interestingly, the U-shaped relationship has also been observed for female labor force participation along a rural-urban gradient, as demonstrated by a companion article in Egger et al (2022), which suggests multiple mechanisms may drive a U-shaped pattern. We attempt to control for several labor supply and demand factors in our analysis, to isolate the effect of local income levels as our measure of economic development.…”

Food insecurity and COVID‐19 risk in low‐ and middle‐income countries

“…A strong theme that resonates in this special issue is the extent to women face additional vulnerabilities in various aspects of the food system, for example, in research and development in the United States (Hilsenroth et al, 2021 ) as well as in the informal sector in LMICs (Egger et al, 2021a ). Future research should better identify, which demographic groups, including women, are particularly vulnerable to food insecurity and the source of such disparities.…”

“…Vulnerability to food insecurity is also contingent on demographic and geographic factors. The dominant narrative declares urban households suffer the greatest losses from the disruption of food systems given their reliance on food purchases (Adjognon et al, 2020 ; Aggarwal et al, 2020 ; Egger et al, 2021a , 2021b ; Heady et al, 2020 ; Hirvonen et al, 2020a ; Kesar et al, 2021 ; Mahmud & Riley, 2021 ). In addition, workers in specific occupations may face constraints on their own purchasing power as pandemic policies restrict firm operations and the demand for nontradeable goods and services declines during a local recession.…”

“…Reductions in freight services and restrictions on inter-state transportation hit long-distance food supply chains the hardest in India, by compromising the availability of perishable goods (Mahajan & Tomar, 2020). Households that depend on markets to purchase foods are often more severely impacted (Aggarwal et al, 2020;Amare et al, 2020;Ceballos et al, 2020;Egger et al, 2022Egger et al, , 2021bKansiime et al, 2021;World Food Program, 2020).…”

“…At the early stage of the COVID‐19 pandemic, international policy responses prompted economic precarity in low‐ and middle‐income countries (LMICs) (Egger et al, 2021a , 2021b ; Mobarak & Barnett‐Howell, 2020 ; Mueller et al, 2021 ). Social distancing, workplace closures, and restrictions on mobility and trade had cascading effects on economic activity, food prices, and employment globally.…”