 Legal gender equality as a catalyst for convergenceCan Sever Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, 2025, vol. 73, issue C, 376-391 Abstract: Despite the remarkable progress toward gender equality in the law over the last five decades, the legal environment across the world is still far from providing a level playing field for women. Based on a global sample since the 1970s, this paper finds that greater gender equality in the law facilitates cross-country income convergence over time. The results call for action and provide a reason to be optimistic. The findings imply that legal reforms supportive of gender equality, which could indeed be actionable in the shorter term, help poorer countries catch up with the living standards in the advanced economies. This offers a window of opportunity to set the stage for an inclusive and sustainable growth path in the post-Covid-19 period, given the adverse effects of the pandemic on economic growth and gender gaps. Keywords: Gender inequality; Law; Gender discriminatory laws; Women’s empowerment; Convergence; Economic growth; Economic development (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:streco:v:73:y:2025:i:c:p:376-391 DOI: 10.1016/j.strueco.2025.02.003 Access Statistics for this article Structural Change and Economic Dynamics is currently edited by F. Duchin, H. Hagemann, M. Landesmann, R. Scazzieri, A. Steenge and B. Verspagen More articles in Structural Change and Economic Dynamics from Elsevier |
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