Women-Led Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises During COVID-19: Examining Barriers and Opportunities

Michael Kevane, Aishwarya Lakshmi Ratan and Diva Dhar

Feminist Economics, 2024, vol. 30, issue 1, 244-277

Abstract: This study synthesizes evidence on gender dimensions of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) following the COVID-19 pandemic. Women-led SMEs are associated with lower average profits, lower revenues, fewer employees, smaller networks, and higher costs of capital. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated gender gaps among SMEs and undermined progress toward gender equality. To inform interventions that can support gender-intentional policy and market responses, the study builds on the conceptual model proposed by Andrea Cornwall (2016) to advance the construct of “path-dependent market dynamics,” which captures how gendered social structures of market organization and behavior influence actions. Together with gendered legal discrimination, social norms, internalized behaviors, allocation of care work, mobility, and unequal access to financing, these sticky market features and dynamics can limit the effectiveness of economic recovery programs. The study suggests areas for evidence-based experimentation that can guide gender-intentional interventions for SMEs going forward.HIGHLIGHTS During the pandemic, women-led businesses experienced larger earnings losses and higher closure rates than men-led ones.Among barriers for women-led businesses, gendered structures of market organization and behavior are under-studied.Enduring gender norms can limit effectiveness of economic recovery programs.Gender-intentional enterprise programs should include evaluation components.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13545701.2023.2283477 (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:taf:femeco:v:30:y:2024:i:1:p:244-277

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RFEC20

DOI: 10.1080/13545701.2023.2283477

Access Statistics for this article

Feminist Economics is currently edited by Diana Strassmann

More articles in Feminist Economics from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().