• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

G²LM|LIC

  • About
    • History
    • Investigators
    • Team
  • Projects
    • GLM|LIC
      • Agricultural Labour Markets
      • Gender and Employment
      • Labour Markets in Low-Income Countries
      • Migration
      • Skill Training
    • G²LM|LIC
      • Fact & Policy
      • Fertility & Labour markets
      • Barriers to gender parity
      • The Future of Work
      • Policies & Welfare
    • COVID-19
  • Publications
    • Policy Briefs
    • Synthesis Papers
    • Working Papers
    • Published Articles
    • Book
    • Datasets
  • Events
  • Evidence Finder
  • Call for Proposals

Women’s Mobility and Labor Supply: Experimental Evidence from Pakistan

At a relatively high level of education, women in South Asian cities are less likely to participate in the labor market. However, survey data suggest that many women might be “latent job seekers.” In this paper, researchers study potential barriers women might face while entering the urban labor force. For example, in cities with conservative norms or high crime, female workers face greater restrictions on their physical mobility due to pervasive stigma, harassment, or violence on public transport or in the public space, which in turn enable them to become economically inactive. To fill this gap, the authors enrolled a representative sample of male and female residents of Lahore, Pakistan, including employed, unemployed, and economically inactive, through their job matching platform by conducting a transport randomized controlled trial. While one quarter of women in Pakistan’s Demographic and Health Surveys work outside the home, another quarter say they are willing to work—suggesting that a large number of women may be “latent jobseekers” who are at the margin of participation if specific barriers can be addressed. This group receive more emphasis in the study to particularly understand gender differences since a high fraction of the female workers are latent workers in Pakistan.

They find that reducing physical mobility constraints has a large impact on women’s job search and does not impact men. Women’s response is driven by a women-only transport treatment arm, suggesting that safety and social acceptability, rather than simply cost, are key constraints for women’s mobility. Furthermore, women who are inactive at baseline—neither working nor searching—respond to a women-only safe transport treatment by increasing their job search, but do not respond to mixed-gender transport, suggesting that this constraint may play a role in women’s employment decisions on the extensive margin. The pattern of this result is consistent with safety and social norms being key constraints in female labor force participation. Read the detailed Working Paper here.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Previous Post: « Gender Gaps: Back and Here to Stay? Evidence from Skilled Ugandan Workers during COVID-19
Next Post: Browser’s Don’t Lie? Gender Differences in the Effects of the Indian Lockdown on Digital Activity and Time Use »

Primary Sidebar

COVID-19 Jobs of the World

News from our Twitter Account

  • Wonderful initiative by @FCDOGovUK, check it out 👇 https://t.co/a4kndIgCaH March 9, 2023 10:06 am
  • In celebration of the #IWD, please check out the @GLMLIC project about achieving women’s #Empowerment through polic… https://t.co/Exz2idzLrM March 8, 2023 2:28 pm
  • 📢📢 Call for proposals alert! Large- and small research grants are offered on issues related to gender, labor and gr… https://t.co/Z1tMxQl5ST February 13, 2023 8:05 pm
Twitter

Footer

IZA Logo

Established in 1998 in Bonn, Germany, IZA is an independent, non-profit research institution supported by the Deutsche Post Foundation with a focus on the analysis of global labour markets. It operates an international network of about 1,500 economists and researchers spanning across more than 50 countries.

Based on academic excellence and an ambitious publication strategy, IZA serves as a place of communication between academic science and political practice.

DFID Logo

The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) leads the UK's work to end extreme poverty. We're ending the need for aid by creating jobs, unlocking the potential of girls and women, and helping to save lives when humanitarian emergencies hit.

FCDO is a ministerial department, supported by 12 agencies and public bodies.

© 2012–2023 | IZA – Institute of Labor Economics | Code of Conduct | Imprint