Does Having a Higher Percent of Women-Owned Businesses Correlate with a Decreased Poverty Rate in the United States at the State Level? Evidence from the U.S. Census Bureau and Survey of Business Owners
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Creator
King, Elizabeth M.
Advisor
Wei, Thomas
Abstract
Despite constituting over half of our population, women own only 28.8% of nonfarm
businesses in the United States (Survey of Business Owners 2007). There may be
benefits to increasing the proportion of women-owned businesses to more accurately
reflect the representation of women in the population. I hypothesize that having a higher
percent of women-owned businesses at the state level reduces state poverty rates. Using
data from the U.S. Census and the Survey of Business Owners as well as other sources
during the years 1992, 1997, 2002 and 2007, I find a negative but statistically
insignificant correlation between the percent of women-owned businesses and the
poverty rate at the state level when controlling for year fixed effects and other covariates.
I additionally find an unexpected and statistically significant positive correlation between
the percent of women-owned businesses and the poverty rate at the state level when
controlling for state fixed effects and other covariates, but these results are limited due to
measurement inconsistencies in the data. These findings are therefore limited and
inconclusive.
Description
M.P.P.
Permanent Link
http://hdl.handle.net/10822/760990Date Published
2015Subject
Type
Publisher
Georgetown University
Extent
33 leaves
Metadata
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