Why are women a minority in Economics? Luiza Nassif, currently a researcher at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College in New York, is responsible for answering this and other questions. She holds a bachelor's and master's degree from UFRJ (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro) and a PhD from the New School for Social Research, also in New York. Luiza conducts studies in the area of gender and feminist economics.
Female representation
Luiza Nassif comments on a well-known phenomenon in the field, which is... leak pipe lineIn other words, from graduation to becoming a professor, the number of women decreases as we advance, just as the amount of water decreases when passing through a leaky pipe.
The researcher talks about a vicious cycle in the economy:The lack of female representation in economics means that most professors, most examples, most books, and most papers are written by men.Luiza explains that this creates a sense of strangeness, a certain lack of encouragement for women to believe that they can, in fact, reach those positions.
The result, therefore, is a predominantly male environment, without many female representatives in high positions. And, according to Luiza, having more female professors is fundamental: “for me it was very important to have had a woman as my first professor, in Macroeconomics I, Margarida Gutierrez. That was important for me in that environment.”
Culture of the area
Looking back, we realize how the idea that women have less appreciation for mathematics or quantitative data is socially constructed from the beginning. The researcher even argues that women's participation in mathematics is greater than in economics.
In a male-dominated environment, it is common for women to feel uncomfortable asking questions in a seminar or classroom, for example. Furthermore, when the scenario is reversed, and a woman is presenting a seminar, she is frequently questioned more than the men, with questions that are more aggressive and less related to the topic at hand.
"There are stories of female teachers who are giving a lesson and the student keeps asking questions, and actually disagreeing with what she's saying. Until another student says, 'she's right.'" You need to hear it from a male authority figure; hearing it from a professor with a doctorate isn't enough. Gender authority is much stronger. This hurts.“Luiza reports.
Over time, these episodes accumulate and begin to generate questions, such as "what am I doing here? Why am I studying Economics? Why do I try so hard to stay in this field that doesn't value me?", comments the researcher.
What does the economy lose as a result?
The answer ranges from the choice of topics covered in the field, through the approaches used, and culminating in the economic theory itself. In neoclassical theory, for example, the most widely used in the field, the element of analysis is the individual. And, in many respects, this individual has been defined as Western, white, and male, according to Luiza Nassif.
“This is important because the assumptions we put into our models affect the results. The way you analyze why we have a certain inequality depends on your models and your theories,” explains the researcher. She also points out that the results end up affecting public policies as well.
Furthermore, since the questions are mostly formulated by men, the questions will be considered from that point of view. Here, Luiza highlights the theory of the point of view, within feminist economics, which states: “it’s not that it’s impossible to have a certain objectivity, but this objectivity is achieved when you have several points of view being taken into consideration. To avoid different biases, you need to have different points of view.You need to analyze your object of study from different points of view.
Trends in research
Luiza comments that, within feminist economics, a very popular topic is the care economy. We know that there is a whole branch of domestic activity that is predominantly carried out by women and is not paid – tasks such as cleaning the house, cooking, caring for children, and the elderly. Because it is unpaid, it ends up not being included in the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) calculation, which is the main measure used for well-being.
Therefore, “feminist economists attack this issue of GDP not taking into account this enormous productive effort that takes place in the economy, which makes all other productive activities possible,” says Luiza Nassif.
One difficulty encountered in Brazilian economic research is the lack of detailed information on time use. According to the researcher, the lack of data is an impediment to studies in Brazil: “that’s another issue, having better data. Opening up data by gender, opening up data by race. We need to open up the data, we need to know what is happening, because this has implications for public policies.”
Inequalities during the pandemic
Luiza Nassif has developed several studies on the impact of the pandemic on social inequality in both the United States and Brazil. In a study conducted in partnership with researchers from USP (University of São Paulo), Luiza analyzed multidimensional inequality and COVID-19 in Brazil and found that race is one of the main differentiating factors: "Black people enter this pandemic much more vulnerable than white people," she comments.
In another study, which analyzes public policies adopted for the disease from a gender perspective, the results showed that few had gender impacts, except for emergency aid, which was responsible for slightly reducing the inequalities that were exacerbated.
“When we look at families headed by Black women, they are much more economically affected by the coronavirus. They lose much more income and recover less. We are already seeing some economic recovery, but this is happening more quickly for white people and for men,” explains Luiza.
There is also another study being developed on the impact of emergency aid on poverty. And the expectations for the results are not the best: “women are already more represented among the poor and the extremely poor. We expect not only that the impact will be much greater for women, but even greater for black women, and that the difference in extreme poverty between men and women will widen even further,” concludes Luiza.
