Evaluation of Factors Which Cause Female Poverty in the Eu by Panel Data Analysis

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to investigate the impact of women's unemployment rates and education levels on poverty in 27 European Union member countries. Therefore, an econometric model has been applied by using EU-27 countries' 2005EU-27 countries' -2017 data set. The dependent variable representing female poverty is "female at risk of poverty or social exclusion". The independent variables are the unemployment rate of the active female population and % of women with primary school graduation.While investigating the effect, the augmented mean group estimator (AMG) is used as the econometric analysis method for the model. This estimator is also known as developed by Eberhardt and Teal's (2010).The unemployment rate of the active female population has statistically significant effects on % risk of female's social exclusion and poverty for EU-27 countries, but the primary education graduation ratio has not a statistically significant relationship. The unemployment rate has same-direction relationship with the risk of social exclusion and poverty. Based on this finding, reducing unemployment is a more effective way to eliminate women's poverty in European countries than increasing primary school graduation. In this context, it can be argued that increasing female's labor participation rate in business and employment in European Union countries can effectively prevent female poverty among women.