Gendered integration? How recently arrived male and female refugees fare on the German labour market

Abstract

Objective: This paper examines gender differences in the labour market integration of newly arrived refugees in Germany. In particular, we focus on the heterogeneity in employment rates among female refugees.
 Background: Previous research has demonstrated that refugee women are disadvantaged on the labour market not only compared to their male counterparts, but also compared to other immigrant women. So far, however, little is known about the mechanisms that underlie the specific disadvantages of refugee women.
 Method: Using data from the IAB-BAMF-SOEP Survey of Refugees, we analyse the labour market participation of refugees who migrated to Germany between 2013 and 2017. To test our theoretical assumptions, we apply logistic regressions.
 Results: Our results show that compositional differences in qualifications, family structure, institutional support, and networks can partly explain the gender gap in labour force participation that disadvantage refugee women. We find substantial variation in the importance of different determinants for the labour market outcomes of men and women.
 Conclusion: As the gender gaps in labour supply could be fully attributed to the theoretical mechanisms offered in the literature, further research is needed to disentangle female refugees' employment behaviour.

Labor market situation of refugees in Europe: The role of individual and contextual factors

“…Migration scholars contend that the labor market integration of female refugees falls far behind that of their male counterparts (Pittaway and Bartolomei, 2001;Dumper, 2002;Koyama, 2015;Cheung and Phillimore, 2017;Salikutluk and Menke, 2021;Kosyakova et al, 2022a). In this context, the term "triple disadvantage" emerged, suggesting a cumulative disadvantage related to immigration, refugee status and gender (Liebig and Tronstad, 2018) .…”

“…female refugees' labor market disadvantage decreases but never fully vanishes (Bakker et al, 2017;Brell et al, 2020;Kanas and Steinmetz, 2021;Salikutluk and Menke, 2021;Kosyakova et al, 2022a).…”

“…While female refugees in Great Britain are more likely to participate in language programs than men, they tend to do so later because of unaffordable childcare, problems fitting classes around school hours, the absence of single-sex classes and a lack of confidence in formal education (Dumper, 2002;Cheung and Phillimore, 2017). Moreover, family responsibilities seem to hamper refugee women's social integration (Hartmann and Steinmann, 2021), which in turn translates into fewer opportunities on the labor market (Dumper, 2002;Cheung and Phillimore, 2017;Salikutluk and Menke, 2021;Kosyakova et al, 2022a), a situation which is not unique to refugee women.…”

What explains the low labor force participation of refugee women? Evidence on Syrians in the Netherlands

“…However, previous studies have also observed that refugee women face a double disadvantage, as their employment rate falls significantly below that of refugee men, of other migrant men and women and of the majority population (Brücker et al, 2019;Brücker, Kosyakova, & Vallizadeh, 2020;Elwood Carlson & Williams, 2020;Graeber & Schikora, 2020;Kosyakova & Brenzel, 2020;Liebig & Tronstad, 2018;Maliepaard et al, 2017;Salikutluk & Menke, 2021;Spörlein et al, 2020;Worbs & Baraulina, 2017). For example, five years after their arrival in Germany, 29% of Syrian female refugees were employed, as compared with 57% of Syrian male refugees (Brücker, Kosyakova, & Schuß, 2020).…”

Conquering the labour market: the socioeconomic enablement of refugee women in Austria

“…In this time frame, the gaps between employment rates of refugees and other migrants range from one percent point in the US over 45 percent points in Germany to 69 percent points in Norway (Brell et al, 2020). Generally, refugee women's labour market integration happens more slowly than that of men (Tervola, 2020)-in Germany, the gap between male and female refugees' labour market participation is 29 percentage points (Brücker et al, 2020), and this trend is also observed in other OECD countries (Salikutluk & Menke, 2021). However, studies have shown that achieving employment is as much an integration goal for recently arrived refugee women as it is for their male counterparts (Liebig & Tronstad, 2018).…”