A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands
Despite a policy consensus that closing gender employment gaps will boost economic growth, relatively little is known about the size of these gains in many developing countries. This paper develops a new Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI), which is...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Policy Research Working Paper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Washington, DC: World Bank
2022
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/190541645548827307/A-Gender-Employment-Gap-Index-GEGI-A-Simple-Measure-of-the-Economic-Gains-from-Closing-Gender-Employment-Gaps-with-an-Application-to-the-Pacific-Islands http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37062 |
| id |
okr-10986-37062 |
|---|---|
| recordtype |
oai_dc |
| spelling |
okr-10986-370622022-03-03T05:10:41Z A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands Pennings, Steven Michael EMPLOYMENT GAP FEMALE EMPLOYMENT GENDER GAP HUMAN CAPITAL CHANGE IN EMPLOYMENT FEMALE LABOR SUPPLY FEMALE WORK EMPLOYMENT CATEGORIES Despite a policy consensus that closing gender employment gaps will boost economic growth, relatively little is known about the size of these gains in many developing countries. This paper develops a new Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI), which is equal to the size of long-run GDP per capita gains from closing gender employment gaps. The GEGI is simple and transparent and can be easily constructed using closed-form expressions for almost all countries using macroeconomic employment rate data by gender. The basic variant of the GEGI is the gap between male and female employment as a share of total employment. The full GEGI is similar, but instead of using an aggregate employment gap, the full GEGI is the weighted average of a “better employment gap” and “other employment gap.” The basic and full GEGIs are similar (correlation of 0.97), and both average 19 percent across countries. This means that GDP per capita in the long run would be almost 20 percent higher if female employment were exogenously increased to be the same as men’s (other things being equal). The paper also provides an application for the Pacific Islands, for which a simple measure like the GEGI is particularly important given the lack of alternative estimates. 2022-03-02T21:32:21Z 2022-03-02T21:32:21Z 2022-02-22 http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/190541645548827307/A-Gender-Employment-Gap-Index-GEGI-A-Simple-Measure-of-the-Economic-Gains-from-Closing-Gender-Employment-Gaps-with-an-Application-to-the-Pacific-Islands http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37062 English CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank Washington, DC: World Bank Policy Research Working Paper Publications & Research East Asia and Pacific |
| repository_type |
Digital Repository |
| institution_category |
Foreign Institution |
| institution |
Digital Repositories |
| building |
World Bank Open Knowledge Repository |
| collection |
World Bank |
| language |
English |
| topic |
EMPLOYMENT GAP FEMALE EMPLOYMENT GENDER GAP HUMAN CAPITAL CHANGE IN EMPLOYMENT FEMALE LABOR SUPPLY FEMALE WORK EMPLOYMENT CATEGORIES |
| spellingShingle |
EMPLOYMENT GAP FEMALE EMPLOYMENT GENDER GAP HUMAN CAPITAL CHANGE IN EMPLOYMENT FEMALE LABOR SUPPLY FEMALE WORK EMPLOYMENT CATEGORIES Pennings, Steven Michael A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands |
| geographic_facet |
East Asia and Pacific |
| description |
Despite a policy consensus that
closing gender employment gaps will boost economic growth,
relatively little is known about the size of these gains in
many developing countries. This paper develops a new Gender
Employment Gap Index (GEGI), which is equal to the size of
long-run GDP per capita gains from closing gender employment
gaps. The GEGI is simple and transparent and can be easily
constructed using closed-form expressions for almost all
countries using macroeconomic employment rate data by
gender. The basic variant of the GEGI is the gap between
male and female employment as a share of total employment.
The full GEGI is similar, but instead of using an aggregate
employment gap, the full GEGI is the weighted average of a
“better employment gap” and “other employment gap.” The
basic and full GEGIs are similar (correlation of 0.97), and
both average 19 percent across countries. This means that
GDP per capita in the long run would be almost 20 percent
higher if female employment were exogenously increased to be
the same as men’s (other things being equal). The paper also
provides an application for the Pacific Islands, for which a
simple measure like the GEGI is particularly important given
the lack of alternative estimates. |
| format |
Policy Research Working Paper |
| author |
Pennings, Steven Michael |
| author_facet |
Pennings, Steven Michael |
| author_sort |
Pennings, Steven Michael |
| title |
A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands |
| title_short |
A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands |
| title_full |
A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands |
| title_fullStr |
A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands |
| title_full_unstemmed |
A Gender Employment Gap Index (GEGI) : A Simple Measure of the Economic Gains from Closing Gender Employment Gaps, with an Application to the Pacific Islands |
| title_sort |
gender employment gap index (gegi) : a simple measure of the economic gains from closing gender employment gaps, with an application to the pacific islands |
| publisher |
Washington, DC: World Bank |
| publishDate |
2022 |
| url |
http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/190541645548827307/A-Gender-Employment-Gap-Index-GEGI-A-Simple-Measure-of-the-Economic-Gains-from-Closing-Gender-Employment-Gaps-with-an-Application-to-the-Pacific-Islands http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37062 |
| _version_ |
1764486528847839232 |