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ISS Working Paper 507
Determinants of Urban Job Attainment in Kenya Across Time: Education and Quality of Jobs by Gender / by Wambui R. Wamuthenya
Abstract
Kenya has experienced a sharp decline in formal sector employment and a corresponding increase in informal sector employment. This paper examines the role played by various factors in influencing the sorting of individuals into different sectors of employment in urban Kenya. It examines whether factors influencing the location of individuals in different sectors change over time and differ across gender and thus contributes to an understanding of gender differences in job attainment.
The paper complements the issues addressed in two other studies by the author on the remarkable rise in female Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) and on the gender gap in the incidence of unemployment. As may be expected, in both periods, experience and education are highly valued in the formal sector. Over time, the importance of education in securing labour market access increases by about 5 and 16 percentage points for primary and secondary education levels respectively. However, there are sharp gender differences. For men, the importance of education increases while for women it declines suggesting the presence of labour market segregation. Over time, the negative effect of marital status on female formal sector participation declines reflecting the increasing insertion of married women in the labour market. Underscoring the use of the informal sector as a last resort option, I find that declines in husbands' real earnings are associated with a sharp increase in women's participation in the informal sector. The increasing participation of women in the vulnerable informal sector is consistent with the feminist version of the structuralist characterisation of the informal sector.
Keywords: formal sector, informal sector, education, gender, labour market segregation, feminist dualist and structuralist views
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About the author
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| Wambui Wamuthenya received both her MA and BA degree in Economics from the University of Nairobi. Recently (8th of April 2010), she has attained a doctorate degree in Development Studies on Economic Crisis and Women’s Employment in Urban Kenya at the International Institute of Social Studies of the Erasmus University Rotterdam.
She has been a member of the International Association for Feminist Economists (IAFFE) since 2005, and the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC) since 2000.
Her areas of interest are: labour economics, feminist economics, labour market, poverty, urban livelihoods, shocks/crisis and coping strategies, education, children, youth, women, gender issues and research methods (quantitative and qualitative research methods). |
Page last updated: 08/07/2010