Couple’s Decision-Making Power, Women’s Labour Market Outcomes, and Asset Ownership

Nkechi Owoo

Population Research and Policy Review, 2022, vol. 41, issue 6, No 3, 2365-2391

Abstract: Abstract This paper explores the causal link between couple’s household decision-making power and women’s labour market and economic outcomes. Autonomy refers to the condition of independence while decision-making power can be defined as one’s ability to make important decisions within the household. Autonomy and decision-making power are used interchangeably in this paper. Using the 2018 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey and a series of probit, instrumental probit and multinomial logistic regression models, findings suggest that women who have lower autonomy in their households are less likely to be currently employed and even when they are employed, these women have higher odds of working in family businesses, which are typically associated with greater labour market vulnerability. These women are, however, more likely to own assets, a strategy likely aimed at improving their exit options. Interestingly, when men have relatively more power within the household, there are positive implications for women’s labour market outcomes—women are more likely to be currently employed and less likely to be unpaid workers in family businesses. An explanation for this may be found in the country’s high poverty levels and general economic hardships which necessitates the influx of additional resources into the household through women’s paid employment. Greater absolute and relative autonomy of male partners, however, reduce women’s asset ownership, likely because greater resource accumulation by women, beyond wage receipts, can be an indicator of dominance within the household, a position typically ascribed to men by cultural and patriarchal norms. These results suggest that relative perceptions of authority and autonomy in the household are important determinants of Nigerian women’s labour market behaviours and asset ownership, and the influences of male partners cannot, and should not, be underestimated.

Keywords: Household Decision making; Labour market participation; Assets ownership; Patriarchal culture; Nigeria (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11113-022-09732-4 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:poprpr:v:41:y:2022:i:6:d:10.1007_s11113-022-09732-4

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... es/journal/11113/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s11113-022-09732-4

Access Statistics for this article

Population Research and Policy Review is currently edited by D.A. Swanson

More articles in Population Research and Policy Review from Springer, Southern Demographic Association (SDA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().