No Men, No Cry? How Gender Equality in Access to Credit Enhances Financial Stability

Caroline Perrin () and Laurent Weill
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Caroline Perrin: LaRGE Research Center, Université de Strasbourg

Working Papers of LaRGE Research Center from Laboratoire de Recherche en Gestion et Economie (LaRGE), Université de Strasbourg

Abstract: Literature has found that women outperform men in terms of loan repayment. We can therefore question whether more gender equality in access to credit fosters financial stability. We test this hypothesis using cross-country data on financial inclusion from the World Bank’s Global Findex database and bank-level data on financial stability. We perform regressions at the bank level to check if the female-to-male ratio of access to credit affects financial stability. We find evidence that the gender gap in access to credit exerts a detrimental influence on financial stability. This finding is confirmed in robustness checks that control for alternative measures of financial stability and endogeneity. Therefore our findings support the view that enhancing access to credit for women relative to men is beneficial for financial stability.

Keywords: financial inclusion; access to credit; financial stability; gender equality. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: G21 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ban, nep-fdg, nep-fle and nep-gen
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:lar:wpaper:2021-02

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