Self Employment For Women

This study aims to identify potential policy options to promote equality and economic opportunities for self-employed women, particularly during periods when their businesses are interrupted by ill health or family caregiving. The report describes the research methodology used in the study and presents the results of a literature review. It then addresses the following points: characteristics of self-employed women; interruptions in business earnings; role of government in granting access to special benefits; Quebec's plan to extend parental and maternity benefits to self-employed individuals; a self-funded tax savings plan; private insurance; access to financing. It then presents recommendations that aim to increase accessibility to various forms of income protection for self-employed women.

The discussion on new forms of non-privileged self-employment of women and minorities is usually divided into separate discourses on women’s opportunities on the one hand and ethnic business on the other. The focus in the discussion about the special resources of migrant entrepreneurship has been above all on the assumed collective traditions of ethnic business and not on the individual emancipative resources of the self-employed. This book has brought the two discourses together. While women and migrants are most vulnerable to social exclusion on the labour market, at the same time they are subjects of unrecognized resources for self-employment that have to be taken into account under the special conditions of social citizenship policies in the European Union.

The Missing Entrepreneurs 2017 is the fourth edition in a series of publications that examine how public policies at national, regional and local levels can support job creation, economic growth and social inclusion by overcoming obstacles to business start-ups and self-employment by people from disadvantaged or under-represented groups in entrepreneurship. It shows that there is substantial potential to combat unemployment and increase labour market participation by facilitating business creation in populations such as women, youth, the unemployed, and migrants. However, the specific problems they face need to be recognised and addressed with effective and efficient policy measures. This edition contains in-depth policy discussion chapters on the quality of self-employment, including new forms of self-employment such as dependent and false self-employment, and the potential of self-employment as an adjustment mechanism in major firm restructuring and job shedding. Each thematic chapter discusses current policy issues and challenges, and makes recommendations for policy makers. A data section provides a range of information on self-employment and business creation rates, barriers and key characteristics of businesses operated by social group. Finally, country profiles highlight recent trends in inclusive entrepreneurship, key policy challenges and recent policy actions in each of the 28 EU Member States.

First published in 1998, this volume takes an international approach to women’s evolving perspectives on self-employment, with a particular focus on women in India. Author Uschi Kraus-Harper draws on ten years of research and interviews, visits and observations, gathering women’s stories from around the world. This book deeply explores women’s situations, empowerment, changing perceptions of enterprise, the effects of poverty and gender and what success really means. It is about poor women and their relation to self-employment. It is also about why change has come to some women and not to others.

The Missing Entrepreneurs 2021 is the sixth edition in a series of biennial reports that examine how public policies at national, regional and local levels can support job creation, economic growth and social inclusion by overcoming obstacles to business start-ups and self-employment by people from disadvantaged or under-represented groups in entrepreneurship.