Assessing the Impact of Location on Women's Labor Market Outcomes: A Methodological Exploration

Abstract

One question that has intrigued geographers and other social scientists for decades is how location affects labor market outcomes (for example, labor force participation, occupational status, and wages). Many have observed that what someone ends up doing-whether or not a person even has a job, whether that job is full time or part time, the kind of work one does, how well paid the job is-depends on where that someone lives. However, assessing the impact of location on labor market outcomes is more difficult than making the observation that there seems to be a relationship.

Elderly co-residence and the household responsibilities hypothesis: evidence from Nanjing, China

“…Because the economic returns of female labor do not cover the costs of long work trips, women might increase their real wages through shorter commutes. Alternatively, others argue that shorter commutes result from the spatial pattern of female-dominated employment opportunities: because jobs for women are more evenly distributed than jobs for men, it is much easier for women to find a job close to home (Hanson & Johnston, 1985;Hanson et al, 1997). The shorter commutes of women could also reflect a high spatial segmentation of the local labor market, which is a combined result of the job search strategies of employees and the location and hiring practices of employers (Hanson & Pratt, 1995;MacDonald, 1999).…”

“…However, whereas there is considerable work on the links between land-use characteristics and travel patterns (Ewing & Cervero, 2001;Feng, Dijst, Prillwitz, & Wissink, 2013), less effort has been devoted to revealing how land use may interact with gender to influence travel patterns (for an exception, see Hanson, Kominiak, & Carlin, 1997). Therefore, we will include the effects of some location factors in our study of gender differences.…”

Universities as Anchor Institutions: Economic and Social Potential for Urban Development

“…Examination of intra-metropolitan labor markets reveals clear patterns by race, ethnicity, and income level (Hanson et al, 1997 ) and raises questions about how the spatial distribution of jobs explains high unemployment in urban central cores (Raphael, 1998 ;Thomas, 1998 ;Thompson, 1997 ;Zhang, 1998 ). Ihlanfeldt and Sjoquist ( 1998 ) review the research literature and conclude that there are fewer jobs per workers in areas with a high percentage of African-American residents as compared to areas with a high percentage of white residents (Gabriel & Rosenthal, 1996 ;McLafferty & Preston, 1992 ).…”

“…The conceptual argument is that the trickle-down benefi ts of supporting the creative class grow the broader urban economy, but research has not yet determined how or why this trickle-down may occur. When workers are physically isolated from job opportunities or confi ned to areas with little to no industry, economic growth spreads unevenly across the region (Hanson, Kominiak, & Carlin, 1997 ;Ihlanfeldt & Sjoquist, 1998 ).…”

In Good Company Neighborhood Quality and Female Employment

“…In Hanson and Pratt [1991] and Hanson, Kominiak and Carlin [1997], the location and occupational choices of women are significantly associated with their labor-market participation. Information channels that determine job matches are shown to be different for men and women and, specifically, for women in female-dominated occupations as opposed to women in male-dominated occupations.…”