Women’s Economic Participation  and the Impact of Regulatory Barriers

Publication:
Women’s Economic Participation and the Impact of Regulatory Barriers

dc.contributor.author	Adnane, Souad
dc.date.accessioned	2021-11-09T18:21:00Z
dc.date.available	2021-11-09T18:21:00Z
dc.date.issued	2021-10-18
dc.description.abstract	Many countries seek to improve women’s economic participation with the introduction of targeted laws and regulations. The impact of these reforms appears significant, although the supporting evidence is stronger in some areas than others. This insight paper considers the impact of legal discrimination and the absence of protective legislation on women’s economic outcomes, namely employment and earnings. It also explores the various pathways or channels through which laws and regulations affect those outcomes. An understanding of those mechanisms is important to the effective design and implementation of gender equal and gender sensitive laws and policies. A survey of the literature uncovered five key pathways that individually and in combination can help structure and improve the understanding of how legal reform impacts women’s employment and earnings. The available literature offered more causal evidence in some reform areas, namely property rights, retirement, and divorce laws, than in others. Empirical evidence from the remaining areas (childcare leave policies, occupational segregation, legal capacity within marriage) still establishes significant and strong associations, especially in the first area, between the studied legal reforms and women’s economic outcomes. Findings reported in the area of legal protections from violence and discrimination remain limited and inconclusive. There is a significant gap in the literature in terms of studies covering certain reforms in developing countries which undermines the generalizability of the findings. The paper concludes that although legal reform is not enough to bring about change, it is a critical first step in initiating social change and promoting women’s economic participation and women’s employment in the formal sector.	en
dc.identifier	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/undefined/140781634540887017/Women-s-Economic-Participation-and-the-Impact-of-Regulatory-Barriers
dc.identifier.doi	10.1596/36511
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/10986/36511
dc.language	English
dc.publisher	World Bank, Washington, DC
dc.relation.ispartofseries	Equitable Growth, Finance and Institutions Insight;
dc.rights	CC BY 3.0 IGO
dc.rights.holder	World Bank
dc.rights.uri	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo
dc.subject	FEMALE LABOR FORCE PARTICIPATION
dc.subject	CHILDCARE
dc.subject	LABOR MARKET
dc.subject	ACCESS TO FINANCE
dc.subject	INTRAHOUSEHOLD BARGAINING
dc.subject	GENDER
dc.subject	LEGAL REFORM
dc.title	Women’s Economic Participation and the Impact of Regulatory Barriers	en
dc.type	Working Paper	en
dc.type	Document de travail	fr
dc.type	Documento de trabajo	es
dspace.entity.type	Publication
okr.crossref.title	Women’s Economic Participation and the Impact of Regulatory Barriers
okr.date.disclosure	2021-10-18
okr.date.doiregistration	2025-05-05T12:47:55.363531Z
okr.date.lastmodified	2021-10-18T00:00:00Z	en
okr.doctype	Publications & Research
okr.doctype	Publications & Research::Working Paper
okr.docurl	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/undefined/140781634540887017/Women-s-Economic-Participation-and-the-Impact-of-Regulatory-Barriers
okr.guid	140781634540887017
okr.identifier.externaldocumentum	090224b088a92b55_1_0
okr.identifier.internaldocumentum	33494029
okr.identifier.report	165187
okr.imported	true	en
okr.language.supported	en
okr.pdfurl	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/140781634540887017/pdf/Women-s-Economic-Participation-and-the-Impact-of-Regulatory-Barriers.pdf	en
okr.topic	Gender::Gender and Development
okr.topic	Gender::Gender and Law
okr.topic	Law and Development::Law and Gender
okr.topic	Law and Development::Legal Reform
okr.topic	Social Protections and Labor::Labor Markets
okr.unit	EFI-FCI-TIC-Investment Climate (ETIIC)