Gender inequality and economic growth: evidence from industry-level data

Abstract

This paper examines whether higher gender equality facilitates economic growth by enabling better utilization of female labor. By allocating female labor to its more productive use, we hypothesize that reducing gender inequality should disproportionately benefit industries with relatively higher female share in their employment. In a sample of manufacturing industries from 65 EMDEs over the period of 1990–2018, we find a positive growth differential of about 26 percentage points over a decade between industries with a high and low female share in employment when they are located in a low gender inequality country compared to a country with high gender inequality