Abstract

The outbreak of COVID-19 has affected men and women worldwide. The gender dimension of COVID-19 has attracted the attention of researchers and policymakers: while women seem to be less severely hit by the virus and are more compliant with the restricting rules imposed to reduce the spread of the contagion, they risk to suffer more the economic consequences of the pandemic, because they are more vulnerable on the labor market and because they are carrying on most of the burden of housework and childcare which increased substantially during the lockdown. Public policies are required to address the emergency and to deal with its gender implications. Anecdotal evidence suggests that women leaders have performed better than men in dealing with the emergency. This paper explores the evidence on the gender dimension of the pandemic under a new perspective proposed by Profeta (2020), focused on the double relationship between gender equality and public policy: on one side, I show which policies can support gender equality in times of COVID-19 and, on the other side, I explore whether women leadership can promote successful measures. While the evidence provided is only suggestive, future studies should assess causal relationships. (JEL codes: J16 and J18)

中文翻译：

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COVID-19 期间的性别平等和公共政策

摘要

COVID-19 的爆发影响了全世界的男性和女性。COVID-19 的性别维度引起了研究人员和政策制定者的关注：虽然女性似乎受到该病毒的严重打击，并且更遵守为减少传染病传播而实施的限制规则，但她们面临更多风险这一流行病的经济后果，因为她们在劳动力市场上更容易受到伤害，而且她们承担了大部分家务和育儿负担，而这些负担在封锁期间大幅增加。需要制定公共政策来应对紧急情况并解决其对性别的影响。轶事证据表明，女性领导人在应对紧急情况方面比男性表现更好。本文在Profeta（2020）提出的新视角下探讨了大流行的性别维度的证据，重点关注性别平等与公共政策之间的双重关系：一方面，我展示了哪些政策可以在疫情期间支持性别平等。 COVID-19，另一方面，我探讨女性领导力是否可以促进成功的措施。虽然所提供的证据只是提示性的，但未来的研究应该评估因果关系。（JEL 代码：J16 和 J18）