This presentation is part of: D00-1 (2026) Recent Development Issues in Microeconomic Theory

Regional Disparities in the Well-Being of Greek women

Nelly-Eleni Pavlidou, Ph.D., Economics, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 156 Egnatia Str, Thessaloniki, 54124, Greece

ARISTOTLE UNIVERSITY OF THESSALONIKI                                       
           
                                                                        
REGIONAL DISPARITIES IN THE WELL-BEING OF GREEK WOMEN
KOSTOPOULOU STELLA, NELLY-ELENI PAVLIDOU[1], TSALIKI PERSEFONI
SEPTEMBER 2008
Abstract

Greece, as almost any other country in the world, is characterized by clear gender and regional differences.

Due to imported global economic problems as well as domestic unsuccessful policies, the country is confronted in the recent years with rising rates of inflation, unemployment above the EU average, poverty, the rise of household debt, phenomena of corruption. Unfavorable changes, such as the shrinkage of employment rights and protection, together with the diffusion of short-term flexible employment and fragmented reward systems, the adherence to policies of more privatisation and less state, changes in the social security and tax system, contribute to the expansion of income inequality and poverty. All these changes affect significantly the living standard of Greek people, especially that of women, who are still the disadvantaged ones in the family, the labor market and the society as a whole. It is assumed though that, because of unequal regional economic growth and disparities in the regional options, the well being of women will differentiate regionally as well. The aim of the paper is to explore the regional differentiation of the objective well-being of Greek women, that is, to examine whether there are regional inequalities in the well-being:

  • within the group of  Greek women and
  • between women and men.
 
As a first step a number of indicators is discussed, by which the objective well-being of women relative to men can be measured. The focus will be on five dimensions of well-being: material well-being, health, education, and participation in the productive and social sphere. The next step is to build a gender well-being index for Greece and to estimate the regional differentiation of this index.

It is hypothesized that women are better off in regions that offer better access to education and health services, better labour market opportunities, higher participation rates, more skilled jobs, lower levels of the officially recorded and of hidden unemployment, lower levels of hidden employment, higher incomes, lower gender wage gap, higher status in the occupation, more full-time than flexible jobs, less poverty. Keywords: Gender well-being, Gender disparities, Regional disparities, Greece
JEL-Codes: I3, J16, O1, R20, R23


[1]Department of Economics, Division of Development & Planning, University Campus, Law School Building, GR-541 24 Thessaloniki, Greece. Email: pavlid@econ.auth.gr