Arbeitspapier
Women's labour supply and household insurance in Africa
This paper investigates whether cyclical variation in women's labour supply in Africa contributes to smoothing household consumption. We find little support for this hypothesis. Using comparable individual data on about 0.5 million women in 30 Sub-Saharan African countries merged with country level panel data on GDP during 1987-2006, we find that the within-country relationship of women's employment and income is, on average, positive. This finding is robust to controls for country-specific trends and potentially correlated shocks. Examination of business cycle variation in the distribution of women's employment across sectors suggests that recessions are associated with increases in unemployment and self-employment relative to paid employment. The results have potentially important implications for understanding coping mechanisms, labour markets, fertility timing, and investments in children.
- ISBN
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978-92-9230-529-1
- Language
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Englisch
- Bibliographic citation
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Series: WIDER Working Paper ; No. 2012/66
- Classification
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Wirtschaft
Time Allocation and Labor Supply
Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
- Subject
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insurance
women's labour supply
added worker effect
business cycles
Africa
Weibliche Arbeitskräfte
Arbeitsangebot
Haushaltsökonomik
Konjunktur
Afrika südlich der Sahara
- Event
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Geistige Schöpfung
- (who)
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Bhalotra, Sonia
Umaña-Aponte, Marcela
- Event
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Veröffentlichung
- (who)
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The United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER)
- (where)
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Helsinki
- (when)
-
2012
- Handle
- Last update
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10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET
Data provider
ZBW - Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Wirtschaftswissenschaften - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. If you have any questions about the object, please contact the data provider.
Object type
- Arbeitspapier
Associated
- Bhalotra, Sonia
- Umaña-Aponte, Marcela
- The United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER)
Time of origin
- 2012