What Firm Characteristics Determine Women's Employment in Manufacturing? Evidence from Bangladesh

Abstract

Purpose -This study investigates the principal determinants of women's employment in the manufacturing sector of Bangladesh using a firm-level panel data from the World Bank's 'Enterprise Survey' for the years 2007, 2011 and 2013. The paper sheds light on the demand-side factors, mainly firm-level characteristics, which also influence this decision.Design/methodology/approach -We estimate a fractional logit model to model a dependent variable that is limited by zero from below and one from above. Findings -The results indicate that firm size, whether medium or large, and firms' export-oriented activities, have an important impact on women's employment in the manufacturing sector in Bangladesh. Moreover, we find that women are significantly more likely to work in unskilled-labour intensive industries within the manufacturing sector. Research limitations/implications -The research is limited to Bangladesh; however, much of the evidence presented here has implications that are relevant to policymakers in other developing countries.Practical implications -The study identifies factors that affect female employment, that is, where the main constraints to increase female labour force participation. The study focuses on the demandside factors, which has been somewhat neglected in recent years. As such, it has practical policy implications.Social implications -Focusing on female employment in Bangladesh also sheds light on the nexus between labour market opportunities and social change within a country that is characterised by extreme patriarchy, which has wide-reaching implications.

Gender spillovers in foreign direct investments: An analysis of Namibia

“…The study finds that firm related factors such as private ownership and exporting activities improve females' participation in the labour force. Ahmed, Feeny, and Posso (2016) conduct a similar study in Bangladesh's manufacturing sector and also find that size and exporting activities of firms have an impact on female labour participation. More so, women are found to work in unskilled and labour‐intensive sub‐sectors.…”

Liberal gender equality and social difference: an institutional ethnography

“…Such a milieu results in a situation wherein talk is at the level of liberal equality, but the execution is steeped in the ideologies and practices of managerialism that privilege certain notions of appropriateness of goals, resources and people that mirror the discourses and practices of social difference (Lorbiecki and Jack, 2000;Vehviläinen and Brunila, 2007). In addition, the gender diversity and inclusion initiatives often fail because they are subject to the prejudices of the organizational actors (Figueiredo, 2015;Kramer and Ben-Ner, 2015), they ignore the established organizational power structures (Holck, 2016), they do not account for the organizational context (Ahmed et al, 2016;French and Strachan, 2015) or the social context (Afrianty et al, 2015;Bešić and Hirt, 2016;Knights and Omanović, 2016;Pringle and Ryan, 2015;Tlaiss, 2013), or do not account for life stage (Neale and White, 2014;Riaño et al, 2015). In addition, gender diversity initiatives are treated as a compliance issue (Payne and Bennett, 2015;Ravazzani, 2016) or as a business imperative (Knights and Omanović, 2016).…”