The female labor market and gender equality

Abstract

This paper is a cross-national panel study evaluating how education-, health- and political dimensions of gender equality are affected by the size and composition of the female labor market. The hypothesis is that improving labor force participation and female employment in the service sector have a positive relationship with the dimensions of gender equality. Gender equality is measured using three sub-indices from the Global Gender Gap Index by World Economic Forum. The sub-indices are; Educational Attainment, Health and Survivability and Political Empowerment. The hypothesis is tested by using both a time-averaged-Ordinary least squares regression and a fixed effects estimation. The results of this paper confirm that, on an international level, service employment is positive for educational attainment, but no evidence was found regarding labor force participation. The result also suggests that the effect of increasing service employment is positive with diminishing marginal returns. There are some evidence of service employment having a positive relationship with health and survivability, but no evidence for the labor force participation. No evidence of an effect on political empowerment from neither labor force participation nor service employment was found, but further research using better data or methods will be needed to conclude these results.