The Gender Implications of Public Sector Downsizing: The Reform Program of Vietnam

Using data from Vietnam, this article describes several types of analysis that could be conducted before launching a major downsizing operation to identify possible gender effects. It draws sev- eral conclusions about Vietnam's downsizing reforms. First, although women's prospects of obtaining salaried jobs following displacement from state-owned enterprise worsened as a result of recent reforms, they are likely to improve in the near future. Second, reforms are associated with a sharp decline in the gender gap in earnings, both in and outside the state sector. Third, overstaffing is greatest in sectors in which most employees are men, such as construction, mining, and transportation; it is much less prevalent in sectors in which women dominate the work force, such as footwear, textiles, and garments. Fourth, training and assistance programs currently in place to help redundant workers reveal no evidence of strong gender bias. Fifth, severance packages based on a multiple of earnings are more favorable to men, whereas lump- sum packages favor women. A comprehensive economic reform program is likely to affect men and women dif- ferently. Some of the effects may be indirect. Moving from central planning to a market economy may change the labor market payoffs to education, for example, which could affect men and women differently given different levels of educational attain- ment. Trade liberalization may change the composition of labor demand and hence the gender structure of employment. Other effects are much more direct, especially when the reform program includes massive public sector downsizing. The burden of job separations may not be borne evenly by male and female workers. The welfare impact of these separations could also differ by gender. It is increasingly accepted that policymaking has to pay attention to social im- pacts, including those on gender. The conceptual framework and the information