Women in the Polish labour market, 2005-2013
The goal of the paper is to show changes in the position of women in the Polish labour market in the period mentioned. It is tried to verified two hypotheses. First, the position of women in the labour market is significantly worse than the position of men. Second, the position of women in relation to the position of men is better and better with the passage of time in the analysed period.
The empirical analysis of the paper is based on the official statistical data coming from the Labour Force Survey in Poland. The data are prepared in such a way that the position of women can be compared with the position of men both for aggregated magnitudes as well as for narrower groups of labour force. These groups are defined by using such criteria as age and educational level.
The conducted analysis leads to the following conclusions. First, the female employment rate is significantly lower than this rate for men. In 2013 the female employment rate amounted to 43,4% and the male rate was higher and amounted to 58,5%. Second, the female rate of economic activity is lower than this rate for men. However there occurred an insignificant increase of female activity rates in the investigated period from 47,7% to 48,5%. The male activity rate was much higher: 62,8% in 2005 and 64,4% in 2014. The stock of inactive persons is predominated by women. Third, the female unemployment rate is higher than the unemployment rate of men on the Polish labour market. In 2013 the female unemployment rate accounted to 10,5% and the male rate to 9,7%. The research indicates that women are one of the groups with high risk of unemployment.