IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/red/sed015/1501.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Structural Transformation and the U-Shaped Female Labor Supply

Author

Listed:
  • Claudia Olivetti

    (Boston University)

  • Rachel Ngai

    (london school of economics)

Abstract

The nature and extent of segmentation of economic activity across genders and its changing roles during the course of economic development has been a central topic of inquiry since Ester Boserup's pioneering work on Woman's Role in Economic Development. The evidence, both historically for the U.S. and other developed economies and over large cross-sections of countries, suggests that the relationship between women's labor force participation and economic development is U-shaped. This paper investigates the link between the U-shaped evolution of womens employment and the process of structural transformation in the course of economic development. Specically, it shows how this pattern can be rationalized based on a model of structural transformation with home production.

Suggested Citation

  • Claudia Olivetti & Rachel Ngai, 2015. "Structural Transformation and the U-Shaped Female Labor Supply," 2015 Meeting Papers 1501, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:sed015:1501
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://red-files-public.s3.amazonaws.com/meetpapers/2015/paper_1501.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Leah Platt Boustan & Carola Frydman & Robert A. Margo, 2014. "Human Capital in History: The American Record," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number bous12-1, May.
    2. Dürnecker, Georg & Herrendorf, Berthold, 2014. "On the Allocation of Time," Working Papers 14-09, University of Mannheim, Department of Economics.
    3. Michael Burda & Daniel Hamermesh & Philippe Weil, 2013. "Total work and gender: facts and possible explanations," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 26(1), pages 239-261, January.
    4. Claudia Olivetti, 2014. "The Female Labor Force and Long-Run Development: The American Experience in Comparative Perspective," NBER Chapters, in: Human Capital in History: The American Record, pages 161-197, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Michelle Rendall, 2011. "The Service Sector and Female Market Work: Europe vs US," 2011 Meeting Papers 778, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    6. Michelle Petersen Rendall, 2010. "Brain versus brawn: the realization of women's comparative advantage," IEW - Working Papers 491, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich, revised Jun 2017.
    7. Mark Aguiar & Erik Hurst, 2007. "Measuring Trends in Leisure: The Allocation of Time Over Five Decades," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(3), pages 969-1006.
    8. Francisco J. Buera & Joseph P. Kaboski & Min Qiang Zhao, 2019. "The Rise of Services: The Role of Skills, Scale, and Female Labor Supply," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 13(2), pages 157-187.
    9. Bridgman, Benjamin, 2016. "Home productivity," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 60-76.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Luca J. Uberti & Elodie Douarin, 2023. "The Feminisation U, cultural norms, and the plough," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 36(1), pages 5-35, January.
    2. Animashaun, Jubril O. & Emediegwu, Lotanna E., 2023. "Rural-to-Urban Migration (RUM) and Women’s Work in Nigerian Households," 2023 Annual Meeting, July 23-25, Washington D.C. 335503, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. L. Rachel Ngai & Barbara Petrongolo, 2017. "Gender Gaps and the Rise of the Service Economy," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(4), pages 1-44, October.
    2. Claudia Olivetti & Barbara Petrongolo, 2016. "The Evolution of Gender Gaps in Industrialized Countries," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 405-434, October.
    3. Doepke, M. & Tertilt, M., 2016. "Families in Macroeconomics," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1789-1891, Elsevier.
    4. Fabio Cerina & Alessio Moro & Michelle Rendall, 2021. "The Role Of Gender In Employment Polarization," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 62(4), pages 1655-1691, November.
    5. Nicola Fuchs-Schuendeln & David Lagakos & Alexander Bick, 2015. "Measuring and Explaining International Differences in Hours Worked," 2015 Meeting Papers 592, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    6. Michelle Rendall, 2018. "Female Market Work, Tax Regimes, and the Rise of the Service Sector," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 28, pages 269-289, April.
    7. Timo Boppart & L. Rachel Ngai, 2021. "Rising inequality and trends in leisure," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 26(2), pages 153-185, June.
    8. So Kubota, 2020. "Culture, Gender, and Structural Transformation: The Case of Turkey," Working Papers 1925, Waseda University, Faculty of Political Science and Economics.
    9. Claudia Olivetti & Barbara Petrongolo, 2014. "Gender gaps across countries and skills: Demand, supply and the industry structure," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(4), pages 842-859, October.
    10. Alessio Moro & Solmaz Moslehi & Satoshi Tanaka, 2017. "Does Home Production Drive Structural Transformation?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 116-146, July.
    11. Duval-Hernandez, Robert & Fang, Lei & Ngai, L. Rachel, 2018. "Social subsidies and marketization - the role of gender and skill," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 87181, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    12. Michelle Rendall, 2018. "Female Market Work, Tax Regimes, and the Rise of the Service Sector," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 28, pages 269-289, April.
    13. Claudia Olivetti & Barbara Petrongolo, 2014. "Gender gaps across countries and skills: Demand, supply and the industry structure," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(4), pages 842-859, October.
    14. Jeremy Greenwood & Nezih Guner & Guillaume Vandenbroucke, 2017. "Family Economics Writ Large," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 55(4), pages 1346-1434, December.
    15. Bridgman, Benjamin & Duernecker, Georg & Herrendorf, Berthold, 2018. "Structural transformation, marketization, and household production around the world," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 102-126.
    16. Benjamin Bridgman, 2016. "Engines of Leisure," BEA Working Papers 0137, Bureau of Economic Analysis.
    17. Robert Duval‐Hernández & Lei Fang & L. Rachel Ngai, 2023. "Taxes, subsidies and gender gaps in hours and wages," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 90(358), pages 373-408, April.
    18. Robert Duval-Hernandez & Lei Fang & L. Rachel Ngai, 2017. "Taxes and Market Hours: The Role of Gender and Skill," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2017-8, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    19. Alexander Bick & Nicola Fuchs-Schündeln, 2018. "Taxation and Labour Supply of Married Couples across Countries: A Macroeconomic Analysis," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 85(3), pages 1543-1576.
    20. Alessio MORO & Solmaz MOSLEHI & Satoshi TANAKA, 2017. "Marriage and Economic Development in the Twentieth Century," JODE - Journal of Demographic Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 83(4), pages 379-420, December.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:red:sed015:1501. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Christian Zimmermann (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sedddea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.