What was the Influence of Labour Market and Family Policy Institutions on the Gendered Labour Market Impact of the Great Recession?

A gendered analysis of the Great Recession is of interest for several reasons. First, economic crises are profoundly gendered phenomena (European Commission, 2012). Labour markets being structured unequally by gender (Lewis, 2002), impacts of exogenous shocks such as crises are expected to have gendered effects. Second, gendered labour market structures are extremely policy relevant, with economies facing shrinking population workforces (Harper, 2014), while women's labour market potential is not fully realized (Elborgh-Woytek et al, 2013). Crises are opportunities to examine existing policy, as they are theorized to exacerbate gendered institutional effects on labour markets (Kushi and McManus, forthcoming). Third, crises can lead to transformative policy change (Hemerijck, 2012); gender analysis of such change can inform both research and policy.
The global financial crisis of 2008 had a severe labour market impact (European Commission, 2009). At the onset, male employment was most negatively impacted due to sectoral segregation (International Labour Organization, 2010; Périvier, forthcoming). However, within sectors, gender differences in employment impact may be more varied (Rubery and Rafferty, 2013). Preliminary analysis of Eurostat (2017) data shows that, after controlling for sectoral segregation, the gendered employment impact of the crisis varies across European Union countries (Appendix, Graph 1). In addition, patterns vary for measures of job quality, such as part-time work (Appendix, Graph 2a-e). The research aims to investigate these divergent patterns.
The crisis consisted of two phases, an initial economic shock, and a subsequent austerity phase (Kushi and McManus, forthcoming). The research will examine labour market outcomes during both phases from a gender perspective. Outcomes to be investigated include measures of job quantity, such as employment, and job quality, such as part-time employment, taking account also of unpaid care work. Finally, the impact on career progression in occupations and incomes will be examined.
As will be detailed in section II, institutional context is theorized to influence gendered labour market structures (CEPS 2012; OECD, 2013; Goméz-Salvador & Turunen, 2008) and gendered vulnerability to recessions. In particular, women - who experience more career transitions and are often primary carers - tend to be better integrated in labour markets with higher flexibility (Estévez-Abe, 2005) and provision of family-related services (Mandel and Semyonov, 2006).
In the context of the research, institutional analysis is therefore two-fold. First, the project will investigate the impact of labour market institutions, such as employment protection. Second, the research will consider family policy institutions, such as child care provision. Having defined the relevant concepts, we can develop questions to guide the research: 1. Is there a gender difference in the impact of the Great Recession on labour market outcomes in terms of quantity (e. g. employment) or quality (e.g. part-time work)? If so, does it vary across countries? Does the impact differ between the two crisis phases? 2. If there are country differences in crisis impact, how are these influenced by institutional context? 3. Is there a gender difference in crisis impact on career progression? How does it compare to differences found in (1)? How is this influenced by institutional context.