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" Three Essays on Female Labor Force Participation, Commitment to Work and Intra-household Time Utilization "
Rajeh, Mai
Willoughby, John
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Latin Dissertation
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| Language of Document
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English
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| Record Number
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1051884
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| Doc. No
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TL51001
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| Main Entry
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Rajeh, Mai
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| Title & Author
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Three Essays on Female Labor Force Participation, Commitment to Work and Intra-household Time Utilization\ Rajeh, MaiWilloughby, John
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| College
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American University
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| Date
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2019
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| Degree
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Ph.D.
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2019
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| Note
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251 p.
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| Abstract
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This dissertation focuses on women’s labor market outcomes and their utilization of time. Essay 1 analyzes the degree of Saudi married women’s commitment to work and the factors that shape their commitment, given that there is a retention problem of mothers in the Saudi labor force. The share of married women in the total Saudi female labor force has been decreasing (from 67.5 percent in 2014 to 63.7 percent in 2016). The essay follows a mixed-method study, utilizing both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The quantitative part of the study is based on data collected in Jeddah City through questionnaires, which resulted in a sample size of 200 married working women. The qualitative part of the study is based on data derived from 10 interviews with working mothers in Jeddah City. Using an ordered logit model, I observed that Saudi working mothers display a relatively high commitment to work. The study findings provide evidence that education, family financial background, husband’s education, and father-in-law education, work factors such as low income, lack of productive jobs, discrimination, and lack of childcare services, and social norms and attitudes towards women’s work are the major variables associated with married women’s work commitment, which if tackled could increase their retention in the labor force. The results provide empirical evidence on the points raised by the Ministry of Labor and Social Development of Saudi Arabia regarding the areas that must be addressed to increase female retention in the workforce. The second essay investigates the determinants of female labor force participation in Egypt. It mainly focuses on the impact of patriarchy and social conservatism in the family setting. It has been noted by many researchers who study labor market outcomes in Egypt that these outcomes are mainly affected by religion and culture. Cultural factors could be a significant factor that negatively affects female labor force participation. Egypt suffers from very low and stagnant female labor force participation compared to other countries in the Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) region, which I point out is due to in addition to patriarchy that is found in many of these countries, Egypt is much more conservative. Using data from Egypt Labor Market Panel Survey (2012) I measured patriarchal culture using an index variable constructed from variables reflecting whether the woman participates in decision making regarding household purchases, their own purchases and health, and their children’s health and schooling decisions, while social conservatism was constructed from variables reflecting whether women need to get permission to go outside the home. Using a probit model, I tested the conditional labor supply model and included demand-side factors, in addition to the cultural variables and found that patriarchy and social conservatism are significantly and negatively associated with women’s labor force participation in Egypt. The third essay examines the factors associated with Mongolian men and women time use. Mongolia transitioned from a centrally planned economy to a market-based economy, that increased poverty throughout the country. Despite the low income of the households, female labor force participation was declining in Mongolia. Researchers noted that the heavy burden on women in household and care work has affected their ability to be involved in employment work. This is further exaggerated by the poor economic conditions of the families that prevent them from substituting home-produced goods that heavily depends on their labor. Further, the lack of basic infrastructure lengthens the time women spend in household and care work. Further, labor market participation and the use of time differ based on the region. Thus, this essay examines the relationship between participation and time spent in employment work with household and care work based on Mongolian Time Use data for 2011 for rural and urban subsamples. The study finds that women in Mongolia spend as much as double the time that men spend on housework and care activities. The study also finds that men and women participate in and spend the same amount of time in employment work in rural areas. However, participation in and time performed in employment work are statistically different between men and women in urban areas. Thus, the study focus on urban areas. Using a Probit model to examine the probability of participating in employment work, I observed that higher wealth is associated with a higher probability of women to participate in employment work. Further, using a Tobit model to examine the determinants of time in employment work, I observed that care responsibilities are not significantly associated with women’s time in employment work. However, the household work burden is significantly related with women’s ability to perform more employment work. The main conclusion of this essay is that improved infrastructure is associated with more time to be devoted by women on employment work. This suggests that access to adequate infrastructure is associated with a reduction in the time spent on household work, which in turn, is associated with an increase in the time spent in employment work. Further, improved economic conditions that increase the ability of households to obtain market substitutes for home-produced goods and services and purchase time-saving appliances reduces time spent in household work, which in turn is associated with an increase in women’s ability to perform more employment work.
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Economics
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Womens studies
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Willoughby, John
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American University
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