Who brings emissions home? Comparing female and male breadwinner households by matching techniques

Abstract

This paper tests the hypothesis that female and male breadwinner household present significant differences in the greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions patterns induced by consumption. We investigate this issue by studying a sample of consumption basket of Spanish households for 2008, 2014, and 2018, linking consumption levels with emissions by means of input-output analysis. Once a vector of GHG emissions have been calculated for each household sampled, we apply the Propensity Score Matching estimator to analyze the mean difference between households with female and male breadwinners, finding a significant negative effect of having female breadwinner households on the GHG emissions patterns derived by household energy consumption, mainly due to the larger use of private transport by male breadwinner households. These results contribute to the growing demand for studies linking environment and gender and to expose the role of women in sustainable energy production and consumption. Therefore, policies that encourage the inclusion of women in different economic activities are also likely to have climate related benefits.