Vulnerability of Latin American Migrant Families Headed by Women in Spain During the Great Recession: A Couple-Level Analysis

Abstract

One of the outcomes of the Great Recession has been the emerging pattern of households maintained exclusively by women. The analysis of intra-couple characteristics is crucial in the context of job segregation by gender and by immigrant origin, such as in Spain. Using the panel version of the Spanish Labor Force Survey from 2008 to 2015, we analyze the transition of dual earner couples to female-earner couples among Latin American and Spanish born households. Our results suggest that migrant vulnerability is not only a consequence of a segregated labor market by gender and origin but is also the result of the partners' relative occupational and family characteristics. We show that, unlike Spanish-born couples, the risk of Latin American families becoming female-headed is higher for those couples in which the female partner has the weakest position in the occupational scale and for those with children in the household.

La división de los roles de género en las parejas en las que solo trabaja la mujer en Estados Unidos y España

“…El aumento de las parejas con doble ingreso se desaceleró con la recesión económica, que tuvo un efecto más fuerte en el empleo masculino que en el femenino. La recesión también produjo un número creciente de mujeres que se convirtieron en el único sustentador de su hogar (Bueno y Vidal, 2019).…”

(Un)doing gender in female breadwinner households: Gender relations and structural change

“…The implications of the Great Recession and austerity policies for gender inequalities have been manifold. First, they resulted in an intensification of women's paid labor and a reinforcement of their contributions to household income, particularly among the low‐educated (Távora & Rodríguez‐Modroño, 2018) and immigrant population (Bueno & Vidal‐Coso, 2019). The paradigm of the female‐breadwinner household in Spain is one composed of a male industrial or construction worker and a female semi‐skilled or unskilled services employee (Sánchez‐Mira, 2020).…”

Differences in Skill Requirements Between Jobs Held by Immigrant and Native Women Across Five European Destinations

“…The crisis greatly shaped immigration inflows and outflows to Italy and Spain as it was particularly intense in sectors with high levels of immigrant employment (construction, tourism, and related trades) (Rodriguez-Planas, 2016). Among Latin Americans in Spain, it affected men particularly harshly, while the finances of many households fell on women shoulders (Bueno Vidal-Coso, 2019) who traditionally have high employment rates in the country (Amuedo Dorantes and Rica, 2007). The sectoral distribution of immigrants in the other three countries was more balanced.…”