Convergence des taux de chômage et persistance des inégalités femmes-hommes. L’impact du diplôme et de la présence des jeunes enfants sur l’emploi et le non-emploi

This article analyses the ?continuum? of labour market situations of women and men in France in 2016. Several situations are distinguished: full-time employment; part-time employment with short or long hours; unemployment (ILO definition); the potential additional labour force (using INSEE?s definition of the ?unemployment halo?, which is broader than Eurostat?s definition); and inactivity. Women?s and men?s situations are analysed and compared according to educational level and the presence of young children. It appears that very different continua can lead to similar unemployment rates for men and women, questioning the relevance of this indicator, which is the one mostly used in public debate. Using a multinomial logit model, an econometric analysis confirms that women are always more likely to be in any situation but full-time employment and that they are in particular more likely to be in less visible situations such as inactivity or the potential additional labour force. Finally, we show how the crossed effects of educational level and the presence of young children can explain the relative homogeneity of men?s situations compared to the very high diversity of women?s situations on the labour market JEL codes: J16, J21, B54