Technological change and unemployment nexus from a gender perspective: empirical evidence from a panel cointegration approach

Abstract

This study investigates the long-run relationship between technological change and unemployment, focusing on a gender perspective in developed economies. Considering the obstacles women face in accessing labor markets, this study aims to empirically combine the technological change and unemployment nexus with a gender perspective in 20 OECD economies from 1985 to 2019 by using multifactor productivity (MFP) as a proxy for technological change. The findings from Westerlund Panel Cointegration Test and Pedroni's Panel-Dynamic Ordinary Least-Squares (PDOLS) estimator indicate the presence of a long-run relationship between MFP and unemployment rate with diversified gender effects. Even though MFP affects total and male unemployment significantly and negatively in the long run, there is no significant effect on female unemployment for the whole panel. However, the findings by economies are diversified and they indicate the presence of technological unemployment for women in some economies. Thus, the empirical results clearly show that the long-run relationship between MFP and unemployment is affected by gender differences.

Keywords:

• MFP
• multifactor productivity
• technological unemployment
• gender

Acknowledgments

The author acknowledges two anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments that greatly improved the study. An earlier version of this study, which excludes the gender perspective and is differentiated in this respect, was presented at the III. International Conference on Empirical Economics and Social Sciences (ICEESS’20) on December 12–13, 2020. The conference participation was supported by Isik University.

Disclosure statement

The author states that there is no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Selda Görkey

Selda Görkey is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Işık University, Istanbul, Turkey. Her research areas concentrate on economic growth and development, economics of technological change, and labor markets. She has authored many publications; including international journal articles, book chapters, and conference proceedings.