Female-Owned Firms in Latin America : Characteristics, Performance, and Obstacles to Growth

This paper examines the characteristics and performance of female-owned firms in Latin America. Data from firm surveys show that female-owned firms tend to be smaller than male-owned firms in terms of employees, sales, costs, and physical capital. Female-owned firms also have lower profits than male-owned firms, but for larger firms this difference disappears after controlling for labor and capital inputs. Medium-size and large female-owned firms are as productive as male-owned firms of the same size, although micro and small female-owned firms are less productive than male-owned firms. There is no evidence that the differences between female and male-owned firms are due to differences in access to finance or regulatory burdens. However, this paper finds a negative correlation between child care and household obligations and female-owned firm size and performance.

Bibliographic Details

Main Author:	Bruhn, Miriam
Language:	English en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2009-11
Subjects:	entrepreneurship, farm ownership, firm ownership, female-owned, child care responsibilities,
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2009/11/11525121/female-owned-firms-latin-america-characteristics-performance-obstacles-growth https://hdl.handle.net/10986/19961
Tags:	Add Tag No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!