Do early marriage and socioeconomic conditions shape women’s labor force participation in Indonesia?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.53088/jerps.v6i2.2980Keywords:
Women’s Labor Force Participation, Early Marriage, Minimum Wage, Gender Empowerment, IndonesiaAbstract
Female labor force participation in Indonesia remains influenced by gender norms and regional development disparities. This study analyzes the effects of early marriage, the Gender Empowerment Index, the provincial minimum wage, and the average years of schooling for women on female labor force participation across Indonesia's 34 provinces from 2015 to 2024. Panel data sourced from Statistics Indonesia (BPS) and the Ministry of Manpower were analyzed using a Fixed Effects Model with robust standard errors to control for unobserved regional heterogeneity. The results indicate that the provincial minimum wage has a positive and significant effect on female labor force participation, with a stronger impact outside Java. Conversely, early marriage and the Gender Empowerment Index do not show a significant direct effect, suggesting the presence of indirect mechanisms operating through socio-economic factors. Average years of schooling show a weak negative relationship at the national level but a positive and significant effect within Java. These findings underscore the importance of labor and women's empowerment policies that are tailored to regional characteristics.
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