Despite many significant gains by women in the paid workforce in recent decades, the percentage of women participating in the labor force has remained lower than the percentage of male participants. Now, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the global economic downturn it precipitated, the gap in labor force participation between men and women1 in some economies has actually widened, with potentially damaging repercussions for women’s career prospects and pay

The gender gap discussed in this Policy Brief measures the difference between the share of women employed or actively looking for paid work, relative to the share of men. To gauge its evolution over time, and especially during the pandemic, we have compiled a new database across 43 countries (36 member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD] and 7 emerging-market economies) representing 60 percent of global GDP (in current US dollars as of 2019).3 These data track trends over 30 years, providing many valuable insights into the evolving and varied nature of male and female workplace presence. The data will also be updated quarterly and made publicly available. Forthcoming research will examine trends over the three decades of the database, with a focus on demographic factors, differences among sectors of the economy, and what can be learned from the experience of varied government policies.