diff --git a/scoping_review.qmd b/scoping_review.qmd index 5245630..b04c4df 100644 --- a/scoping_review.qmd +++ b/scoping_review.qmd @@ -796,11 +796,13 @@ It also suggests that in contexts of weaker unionisation, post-redistribution in Lastly, it finds positive relations between right-wing orientation of a country's government and its income inequality, with more mixed results for centrist governments pointing to potential fragmentations in their redistributive policy approaches. The study is mostly limited in not being able to account for individual drivers (or barriers) and can thus not disaggregate for the effects for example arbitration or collective bargaining. -@Ferguson2015 conducts a study on the effects of a more unionised workforce in the United States, on the representation of women and minorities in the management of enterprises. -It finds that while stronger unionisation is associated both with more women and more minorities represented in the overall workforce and in management, this effect is only marginally significant. -Additionally, there are drivers which may be based on unobservables and not a direct effect --- -it may be a selection effect of more unionised enterprises. -It uses union elections as its base of analysis, and thus can not exclude self-selection effects of people joining more heavily unionised enterprises rather than unionisation increasing representation in its conclusions. +@Dieckhoff2015 undertake a study on the effect of trade unionisation in European labour markets, with a specific emphasis on its effects on gender inequalities. +It finds, first of all, that increased unionisation is related to the probability of being employed on a standard employment contract for both men and women. +It also finds no evidence that men seem to carry increased benefits from increased unionisation alone, +although in combination with temporary contract and family policy re-regulations, men can experience greater benefits than women. +At the same time women's employment under standard contracts does not decrease, such that there is no absolute detrimental effect for either gender. +It does, however, leave open the question of the allocation of relative benefits between the genders through unionisation efforts. +The study is limited in that, by averaging outcomes across European nations, it can not account for nation-specific labour market contexts or gender disaggregations. @Cardinaleschi2019 study the wage gap in the Italian labour market, looking especially at the effects of collective negotiation practices. It finds that the Italian labour market's wage gap exists primarily due to occupational segregation between the genders, with women often working in more 'feminized' industries, and not due to educational lag by women in Italy. @@ -808,12 +810,11 @@ It also finds that collective negotiation practices targeting especially manager The primary channel for only marginal significance stems from internal heterogeneity in that only the median part of wage distributions is significantly affected by the measures. Instead, the authors recommend a stronger mix of policy approaches, also considering the human-capital aspects with for example active labour-market policies targeting it. -@Dieckhoff2015 undertake a study on the effect of trade unionisation in European labour markets, with a specific emphasis on its effects on gender inequalities. -It finds, first of all, that increased unionisation is related to the probability of being employed on a standard employment contract for both men and women. -It also finds no evidence that men seem to carry increased benefits from increased unionisation, although in combination with temporary contract and family policy re-regulations, men do seem to experience greater benefits than women. -At the same time women's employment under standard contracts does not decrease, such that there is no absolute detrimental effect for either gender. -It does, however, pose the question of the allocation of relative benefits between the genders through unionisation efforts. -The study is limited in that, by averaging outcomes across European nations, it can not account for nation-specific labour market contexts or gender disaggregations. +@Ferguson2015 conducts a study on the effects of a more unionised workforce in the United States, on the representation of women and minorities in the management of enterprises. +It finds that while stronger unionisation is associated both with more women and more minorities represented in the overall workforce and in management, this effect is only marginally significant. +Additionally, there are drivers which may be based on unobservables and not a direct effect --- +it may be a selection effect of more unionised enterprises. +It uses union elections as its base of analysis, and thus can not exclude self-selection effects of people joining more heavily unionised enterprises rather than unionisation increasing representation in its conclusions. @Ahumada2023 on the other hand create a study on the effects of unequal distributions of political power on the extent and provision of collective labour rights. It is a combination of quantitative global comparison with qualitative case studies for Argentina and Chile. @@ -832,7 +833,7 @@ the study shows that already job-deprived areas indeed experience further depriv while non-deprived areas are correlated with positive impacts, thereby further deteriorating spatial inequality outcomes. This occurs because of providers in the programme de-prioritizing the already deprived areas ('parking') in favour prioritizing wealthier areas for improved within-programme results. -A study on the effects of previous inequalities on the outcomes of a work programme in India intended to provide job opportunity equality for already disadvantages population. +@Li2022 conduct a study on the effects of previous inequalities on the outcomes of a work programme in India intended to provide job opportunity equality for already disadvantages population. It specifically looks at the NREGA programme in India, and takes the land-ownership inequality measured through the Gini coefficient as its preceding inequality.[^nrega] The study finds that there is significantly negative relationship between the Gini coefficient and the provision of jobs through the work programme. In other words, the workfare policy implemented at least in part to reduce a district's inequality seems to be less effective if there is a larger prior capital inequality. @@ -848,14 +849,14 @@ The results show the same trends for measurement of land inequality using the sh -@Wang2016 undertake an observational study on the levels of social assistance benefits and wages in a national comparative study within 26 developed countries. +@Wang2016 undertake an observational study on the levels of social assistance benefits and wages in a national comparative study within 26 OECD countries. It finds that real minimum income benefit levels generally increased in most countries from 1990 to 2009, with only a few countries, mostly in Eastern European welfare states, showing decreases during the time frame. The majority of changes in real benefit levels are from deliberate policy changes and the study calculates them by a comparison of the changes in benefit levels to the changes in consumer prices. Secondly, it finds that changes for income replacement rates are more mixed, with rates decreasing even in some countries which have increasing real benefits levels. The study suggests this is because benefit levels are in most cases not linked to wages and policy changes also do not take changes in wages into account resulting in diverging benefit levels and wages, which may lead to exacerbating inequality gaps between income groups. -A study looking at the impact of the cash transfer programme Oportunidades in Mexico, conditioned on a household's children school attendance, on income inequality among others. +@Debowicz2014 conduct a study looking at the impact of the cash transfer programme Oportunidades in Mexico, conditioned on a household's children school attendance, on income inequality among others. It finds that a combination of effects raises the average income of the poorest households by 23 percent. The authors argue in the short run this benefits households through the direct cash influx itself, as well as generating a positive wage effect benefitting those who keep their children at work. For the estimation of income inequality it uses the Gini coefficient. @@ -873,24 +874,10 @@ though the authors do not form an inference on why this difference would be. A limitation of the study is that there was a simultaneous child care capacity increase in the country, which may bias the labour market results due to being affected by both the cost reduction and the capacity increase. - -@Clark2019 undertake an experimental study on the impacts of providing childcare vouchers to poor women in urban Kenya, estimating the impacts on their economic empowerment. -The empowerment is measured through disaggregated analyses of maternal income, employment probability and hours worked. -It finds that, for married mothers there was a significantly positive effect on employment probability and hours worked, suggesting their increased ability to work through lower childcare costs increasing personal agency. -For single mothers, it finds a negative effect on hours worked, though with a stable income. -The authors suggest this is due to single Kenyan mothers already working increased hours compared to married mothers, though the effect shows the ability of single mothers to shift to jobs with more regular hours, even if they are not compatible with childcare. -Minor limitations of the study are its restriction to effects within a period of 1 year, and a somewhat significant attrition rate to the endline survey. - -@Hojman2019, in an experimental study looking at the effects of providing free childcare for poor urban mothers in Nicaragua under the 'Programo Urbano', examine the effects on inequality for mothers and children. -It finds that providing free childcare for young children of poor mothers significantly increases the employment probability of the mothers (14ppts) independently of the childcare quality. -It also finds significantly positive impacts on the human capital of the children, though dependent on the quality of childcare facilities. -This suggests childcare costs being removed through a quasi-subsidy reducing the required childcare time burden on mothers, increasing parental agency and employment choices. -Some limitations to the study include a relatively small overall sample size, as well as employment effects becoming insignificant when the effect is measured on randomization alone (without an additional instrumental variable). - @Carstens2018 conduct an analysis of the potential factors influencing mentally ill individuals in the United States to participate in the labour force, using correlation between different programmes of Medicaid and labour force status. In trying to find labour force participation predictors it finds employment motivating factors in reduced depression and anxiety, increased responsibility and problem-solving and stress management being positive predictors. -In turn barriers of increased stress, discrimination based on their mental, loss of free time, loss of government benefits and tests for illegal drugs were listed as barriers negatively associated with labour force participation. +In turn increased stress, discrimination based on their mental, loss of free time, loss of government benefits and tests for illegal drugs were listed as barriers negatively associated with labour force participation. For the government benefits, it finds significant variations for the different varieties of Medicaid programmes, with the strongest negative labour force participation correlated to Medicaid ABD, a programme for which it has to be demonstrated that an individual cannot work due to their disability. The authors suggest this shows the primary channel of the programme becoming a benefit trap, with disability being determined by not working and benefits disappearing when participants enter the labour force, creating dependency to the programme as a primary barrier. Two limitations of the study are its small sample size due to a low response rate, and an over-representation of racial minorities, women and older persons in the sample mentioned as introducing possible downward bias for measured labour force participation rates. @@ -966,6 +953,12 @@ Using an absolute poverty headcount ratio, it finds that a significant 1.6 per c They attribute this primarily to income gains for poorer households and the targeting benefiting the poorest households most by providing them greater income gains. Limitations of the study include the general equilibrium model approach being potentially restricted by its prior assumptions in validity and generalizability, as well as potentially not accounting for unobservables or exogenous shocks. +Due to the nature of most studies on these policy areas being based on modelling simulations, there are some potentially exacerbated blind-spots: +they require a larger reliance on prior assumptions for their results to hold, which includes the effort to subsume all potential relevant channels and mediators into the equilibrium models. +They are generally more prone to disregarding exogenous factors which may provide shock effects into the system under analysis, and often can not cleanly account for longer-term dynamics. +Lastly, they can not address practical implementation challenges which may be faced by those implementing such policies, the institutional context and political ability to pursue the results modeled therein. +So, some caution should be provided in drawing too strong of a conclusion from their findings. + ### Automation and technological change @Bailey2012 undertake a study on the effects of the introduction of legal access to contraceptive measures for women in the United States, measuring the impacts on closing the gender gap through the gendered hourly working wage distribution. @@ -1125,6 +1118,20 @@ The last channel especially is a point of interest of the study: the interventio The intervention also significantly increased possibility of saving in treatment households, allowing for an increased economic security and empowerment, which was also influenced by household head education, landholding, the household's caste and size. The main channel this is accomplished through is a shift to institutionalized saving, with provides increased resilience against shock events. + +@Clark2019 undertake an experimental study on the impacts of providing childcare vouchers to poor women in urban Kenya, estimating the impacts on their economic empowerment. +The empowerment is measured through disaggregated analyses of maternal income, employment probability and hours worked. +It finds that, for married mothers there was a significantly positive effect on employment probability and hours worked, suggesting their increased ability to work through lower childcare costs increasing personal agency. +For single mothers, it finds a negative effect on hours worked, though with a stable income. +The authors suggest this is due to single Kenyan mothers already working increased hours compared to married mothers, though the effect shows the ability of single mothers to shift to jobs with more regular hours, even if they are not compatible with childcare. +Minor limitations of the study are its restriction to effects within a period of 1 year, and a somewhat significant attrition rate to the endline survey. + +@Hojman2019, in an experimental study looking at the effects of providing free childcare for poor urban mothers in Nicaragua under the 'Programo Urbano', examine the effects on inequality for mothers and children. +It finds that providing free childcare for young children of poor mothers significantly increases the employment probability of the mothers (14ppts) independently of the childcare quality. +It also finds significantly positive impacts on the human capital of the children, though dependent on the quality of childcare facilities. +This suggests childcare costs being removed through a quasi-subsidy reducing the required childcare time burden on mothers, increasing parental agency and employment choices. +Some limitations to the study include a relatively small overall sample size, as well as employment effects becoming insignificant when the effect is measured on randomization alone (without an additional instrumental variable). + ### Unconscious bias and discriminatory norms