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Women’s Labor Force Exits during COVID-19: Differences by Motherhood, Race, and Ethnicity

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Abstract

While the descriptive impacts of the pandemic on women have been well documented in the aggregate, we know much less about the impacts of the pandemic on different groups of women. After controlling for detailed job and demographic characteristics, including occupation and industry, we find that the pandemic led to significant excess labor force exits among women living with children under age six relative to women without children. We also find evidence of larger increases in exits among lower-earning women. The presence of children predicted larger increases in exits during the pandemic among Latina and Black women relative to White women. Overall, we find evidence that pandemic induced disruptions to childcare, including informal care from family and friends. Our results suggest that the unique effect of childcare disruptions during the pandemic exacerbated pre-existing racial and income inequalities among women.

Suggested Citation

  • Katherine Lim & Mike Zabek, 2021. "Women’s Labor Force Exits during COVID-19: Differences by Motherhood, Race, and Ethnicity," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021-067r1, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), revised 03 Jul 2023.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2021-67
    DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2021.067r1
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    Cited by:

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    2. David H. Bernstein & Andrew B. Martinez, 2021. "Jointly Modeling Male and Female Labor Participation and Unemployment," Econometrics, MDPI, vol. 9(4), pages 1-14, December.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Women; Labor Force Participation; Race; Ethnicity; Labor Supply; COVID-19;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J70 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - General
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household
    • I14 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Inequality
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health

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