The Role of Structural Fiscal Policy on Female Labor Force Participation in OECD Countries

Miyoko Asai, Qiaoe Chen, Jiro Honda, Xingwei Hu and Qianqian Zhang

No 2023/186, IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund

Abstract: This paper examines the role of structural fiscal policies to promote female labor force participation and reduce gender gaps in labor markets in 26 OECD countries from 2000 to 2019. As both female labor force participation and many explanatory/control variables clearly exhibit non-stationarity (potentially leading to spurious regression results), we employ a panel vector error-correction model, in contrast with most previous empirical studies on this matter. Our analyses confirm statistically significant positive impacts of government spending on (1) early childcare and education, (2) active labor market programs, and (3) unemployment benefits, all of which would help encourage women to enter the labor force, while (4) an increase in relative tax rate on second earner could have negative impact on female labor force participation.

Keywords: Fiscal Policy; Gender; Labor Force; OECD; panel unit root; panel vector error-correction model; robustness test; panel VECM result; female LFPR; age group; regression analysis; positive correlation; standard deviation; Women; Active labor market policies; Gender diversity; Unemployment benefits; Global (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 51
Date: 2023-09-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ger and nep-lab
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