Figure 5 shows the relationship between the share of women in manufacturing of
durables and the relative importance of vocational education in 16 countries for which the
relevant variables were available (countries, for which gender breakdown could not be
attained, were dropped). Figure 5 shows that CMEs (Belgium, Denmark, Finland,
Germany, Luxembourg and Sweden) cluster in the more segregating bottom right in the
graph—fewer women in manufacturing—while most LMEs (Australia, UK and US) are
found at the other less segregating top left.
Given the fact that Scandinavian countries score high on gender egalitarianism
score than some of the LMEs such as Australia and UK, if the cultural thesis were to be
right, we should expect Scandinavian countries to be located at the top left of the graph.
Yet this is not what we observe from Figure 5. Scandinavian social policies to boost
female labor force participation have not resulted in increasing the number of women in
manufacturing either. Although not directly tested, we discussed how strong maternity
protection such as restrictions on women’s night shifts may reduce female employment in
certain sectors of the economy. However, again, Scandinavian countries, which possess
similarly gender-neutral regulation as North American countries, display much lower
shares of women in manufacturing in Figure 5.
In short, the hypothesis H3 presented in this paper appears to be more plausible
than the competing cultural and institutional explanations. Hypothesis could be
interpreted as an institutionally-embedded variant of the human capital thesis. However,
it differs from the human capital thesis in that it pays attention to institutional
environment that might affect men and women differently.
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Convention