Do Lack of Human Capital and Traditional Values Hinder Female Labor Force Participation? The Case of Portuguese Women in the U.S.

Maria Mulcahy, Brown University

This paper examines how cultural, family and human capital characteristics affect the labor force participation of Portuguese women. It uses 1990 US Census data (IPUMS) and logistic regression to compare them to other European Americans in general and Italian Americans in particular. The analysis shows that Portuguese immigrant women are more than twice as likely to be in the labor force than other European Americans with the same personal family, and residential characteristics, while those born in the U.S. are 21 percent more likely. Living in the Northeast, where a large proportion of the Portuguese have settled, enhances the likelihood of labor force participation for Portuguese women, but not for the comparison groups. The findings indicate that Portuguese women, more so than Italians, have been successful in overcoming human capital deficits and traditional, Southern European values to engage in work outside the home, using ethnic networks to do so.