Bald, Fabian; Henkel, Marcel (September 2021). The Role of Local Public Goods for Gender Gaps in the Spatial Economy (CRED Research Paper 33). Bern: CRED - Center for Regional Economic Development
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We assess the role of local public goods provision for gender gaps in the labour
market. We find that higher fiscal revenues of local governments are associated with
decreasing gender employment gaps in German labour market areas because it
decreases labour supply for male workers at a higher rate than for female workers.
The results are robust when we include instrumental variables that address the
endogeneity of local public goods provision. To assess the impact of fiscal transfers
across regions on gender gaps we quantify a spatial general equilibrium model with
multiple types of workers, who are differently affected by local public goods
provision in their labour supply decision. We find that transfers reduce disparities
across regions. This goes along with smaller gender gaps in employment in treated
regions because female workers are disproportionately pulled into market work and
regions with low productivity.