Some similarities - many disparities

Among the immigrant population and in the total population, there are as many women as men. The immigrant population is a composite group - that is if we can describe them as a group. They have backgrounds from 213 different countries and autonomous regions. There are hard-working fathers, enterprising women, frustrated housewives, cheerful children, townsfolk and farmers, lawyers and illiterates. Commenting on what immigrant women and men do or mean is a very far-reaching topic and just as meaningful as describing what all women and men in Norway do or think.

Family for women, work or displacement for men

Between 1986 and 2006, female immigrants constituted 51 per cent of the total net migration of foreign citizens (the difference between the number of people who move to Norway and the number of people who move from Norway). Female and male immigrants arrive in Norway for rather different reasons (see figure 1). While family immigration is the most common reason for female immigrants to come to Norway, the majority of men are refugees. During the period 1990 to 2006, 56 per cent of all non-Nordic women arrived as family immigrants, compared to 30 per cent of the men.

Persons who come to Norway as family immigrants are a complex group. Men often leave first and are subsequently reunited with their families (family immigration). This includes both men who come as refugees and labour immigrants. The rest of the family immigration can be seen as a family establishment. Among these, the majority immigrates to a spouse/partner without an immigrant background. Since the 1990s, there has been an increasing trend that men without an immigrant background marry women from non-Nordic countries. These women are also registered as family immigrants.

During the period 1990 to 2006, four out of ten refugees were women, and this constitutes 24 per cent of all non-Nordic women who immigrated in this period. The corresponding figure for non-Nordic men who came as refugees was 36 per cent. More women than men come to Norway to study. Almost six out of ten of those who came to Norway to study in the same period were women.

Few women immigrate due to labour. During the period 1990 to 2006, 77 per cent of the labour immigrants were men. In 2006, labour immigrants accounted for the largest group of immigrants, totalling 11 700 persons. This constitutes 40 per cent of all non-Nordic immigration that year and eight out of ten of the labour immigrants were men. The increase is mainly due to a rising number of labour immigrants with backgrounds from the new EEA countries in Eastern Europe.

Many immigrant women work

Since 2004, Norway has experienced an economic boom, with falling unemployment and increasing employment. Immigrants have also been affected by these trends. Despite the fact that there was no regular labour immigration to Norway between 1974 and 2004, immigrants provide a substantial contribution to the labour market. In the population as a whole, employment among both women and men is high, and the difference between male and female employment is small.

Among first-generation immigrants, the number of employed women is much lower than the number of employed men, but 82 700 first-generation immigrant women were employed in the fourth quarter of 2006. Women constituted 46 per cent of all employed first-generation immigrants. A total of 55 per cent of all immigrant women (15-74 years) were employed in the fourth quarter of 2006. This was low both compared to all women in Norway (67 per cent) and compared to immigrant men (66 per cent). In other words, employment among women is much lower than among men, and the gender gap is larger among immigrants (more than 11 percentage points) than in the total population (nearly 7 percentage points).

Low employment rate among women from well-established groups

Immigrants from non-western countries deviate more from the total population than other immigrant groups. African first-generation immigrants had a low employment rate in the fourth quarter of 2006, and the differences between women and men are great (38 and 51 per cent respectively). This is also the case for Asian women and men, who have an employment rate of 47 and 60 per cent respectively). Among Nordic women and men, the employment rate is considerably higher and the difference between women and men is smaller (71 and 76 per cent respectively).

The low employment rate among women is also true of many groups with a long period of residence in Norway. This is particularly the case for women with background from Pakistan. Only 29 per cent of Pakistani women are employed, compared to 62 per cent of Pakistani men (see figure 2). The same pattern is evident for other well-established groups, such as those from Turkey and Morocco. Here the gender difference is not as great as between Pakistani women and men (33 percentage points), but still evident (23 and 16 percentage point difference respectively). Similarly low employment levels compared to men are also found among women from more recently-arrived refugee groups Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia (30, 25 and 19 percentage point difference respectively). Among the last three groups, time of resident in Norway can partly explain the low employment rate.

The gender differences in most groups with high employment levels mentioned above were not so pronounced: Bosnia-Herzegovina (6 percentage points), Philippines and Chile (both 7 percentage points), Vietnam (11) and India (12). The employment rate is higher for women than men among immigrants with background from Thailand and Russia (both 5 percentage points).

Many non-western women are probably at home

A much higher share of non-western women than men are outside the labour force. Nearly seven out of ten women with background from Somalia and Afghanistan were neither employed nor registered as unemployed in the fourth quarter of 2006. This is the case for six out of ten Iraqi women. Some are in education and some of the newly-arrived immigrants may attend the introduction programme. But it is likely that the majority is at home. They may choose not to work or to stay at home with small children because they cannot find work, or because they do not register as unemployed. We find the same pattern among well-established groups.

We find nearly as high a proportion outside the labour market among Pakistani (65 per cent), Moroccan (55 per cent) and Turkish (53 per cent) women. It is likely that the time of residence in Norway affects the participation in the labour force among women from Somalia, Afghanistan and Iraq, but it does not explain why the participation is so low among women from Pakistan, Turkey and Morocco.

Young immigrants are in employment

Descendants do not yet represent a large group in the labour market. In the fourth quarter of 2006, they only accounted for 10,200 of those in employment between the ages of 15 and 74. The descendants are still very young, and at 1 January 2007, 85 per cent were below 20 years of age. Nine out of ten had background from a non-western country. The employment rates among young descendants are higher than for first-generation immigrants at the same age, and are nearly as high as for the population as a whole. Descendants in the age group 20-24 have an employment rate of almost 69 per cent; 12 percentage points higher than first-generation immigrants in the same age group and just 4 percentage points lower than the average for this age group (see figure 3).

An interesting aspect of descendant employment is the high rate of employment among younger women. This is very different from first-generation immigrants. Among descendants between 20 and 24 years of age, there are hardly any differences in the employment rate between women (70 per cent) and men (69 per cent), while first-generation immigrants have a more traditional gender distribution with 48 to 61 per cent in favour of men. Corresponding figures for the population as a whole were 72 per cent for women and 74 per cent for men.

However, this pattern does not seem to repeat itself in the age group 25-29 years. In the age group 25-29, the more traditional differences between the genders start to emerge. The employment rate of female descendants is 68 per cent, compared with 76 per cent for male descendants. In this age group the lower employment rate among women is probably due to childbirth and taking care of young children. It must be stressed that the 25-29 age group is the smallest of the age groups among employed descendants and only consists of 2,240 persons.

Cash benefit more important for non-western immigrants

Previous analyses show that the cash benefit for parents of young children, are of much more importance for families of non-western origin than other families. At 1 September 1999, 74 per cent of children in the relevant age group received cash benefit, and in September 2006 the same was true for less than 46 per cent. In 1999, nearly 76 per cent of non-western children received cash benefit. In 2006, the percentage was 69. From 2004 and 2006 there has been a decline in all groups (figure 4).

For children in non-western families, the decline has been most obvious during the last year. The decline is probably a result of both a heavy focus on strengthening kindergarten coverage and a reduction in the monthly kindergarten prices. But among non-western children, the changes can also be explained by the composition of the non-western immigrant group. While children of Pakistani background have been a large group throughout the period, the largest groups of children entitled to cash benefit (1-3 years) were those with background from Somalia and Iraq.

The considerable use of cash benefit among non-western immigrants can have many explanations. One possible explanation is that a high share of women (and men) from some non-western immigrant groups are outside the labour force. The cash benefit is of most importance for families of Pakistani, Turkish and Moroccan background. Whilst at the same time a high share of women from these groups is neither employed nor registered as unemployed.

More information on this topic?

See the Report Gender and Migration. Similarities and disparities among women and men in the immigrant population. The Report gathers part of the data available on women and men with immigrant backgrounds in Norway collected by Statistics Norway. This report provides information on parts of the multifaceted picture that women and men with immigrant backgrounds represent.

Four main subjects are covered:

• demographic structure and change
• education
• labour market participation and
• childcare and cash benefit

Figures are presented in the form of comments, some illustrations, and selected tables for each chapter. The publication presents figures for immigrant women and men in general, focusing on differences within the group by country background and age. The figures are mainly provided at country level.