Gender inequality and economic growth in developing countries

M.Com. (Development Economics)Abstract: The purpose of this study is to identify the relationship between gender inequality and economic growth in developing countries. The system generalised method of moments (system GMM) model and the panel autoregressive distributive lag model are used to evaluate the relationship between gender inequality in human capital and economic growth across developing countries. A gender inequality index was modelled using the disparities in human capital, with the inclusion of maternal mortality. Variables included in this study are gross domestic capital per capita, gross capital formation, school enrolment, labour force participation, the maternal mortality ratio, income groups and the Fragile States Index. The study uses a panel of countries for the period 1960 – 2019, aggregated in 5-year intervals. The results show a positive and significant relationship between gender inequality and economic growth, where 86.4% of the variation in GDP is explained by the gender inequality index. The empirical results illustrate that the gender inequality ratio negatively impacts economic growth and that the gender gap needs to be narrowed to achieve higher levels of economic growth for low-income countries