Recession Severity and Lagging Employment (thesis)

Abstract

This paper uses the Current Population Survey to examine the differential experiences of demographic groups following the Great Recession. Geographic variation in recession severity is used to asses the effect of recession severity on long term employment outcomes. I use three empirical strategies to find that the effect of recession severity on employment is more severe for men in the short run, but quickly evens before affecting women more deeply. Seven years after the lowest point of employment, women are 100% more affected by local recession severity than men. For a 10% decrease in employment during the recession, this paper finds that women's employment after seven years is 4% lower than if there was no drop in employment during the recession while men's is 2% lower. These findings suggest that women suffer the long term effects of recessions significantly more than men.