ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the growth of female-headed households and its association with poverty and gender ideology in two different Latin American countries Brazil and Colombia. On the macro-level the data also point to some similarities such as the higher participation of female heads of household than wives in the labor market, and women’s participation in gender ideology. Brazil and Colombia present a similar picture in relation to female participation in the labor force. The separation of female heads in one-person households from those in multi-person households makes sense, since women who live by themselves might have economic needs different from female heads of household who are mothers of small children. Female heads of family had more flexibility in terms of physical mobility, as they were concentrated in the kind of domestic service work that demanded commuting from their home to their place of employment.
