It is well documented that economicparticipation of women is very low in Turkey compared tothat of men in the country. This gender disparity ineconomic participation is valid not only for participationin the labor market as a wage employee but also forentrepreneurship. Using European Union statistics on incomeand living conditions (SILC) dataset, this paper attempts toprovide new insights on the high gender disparity inentrepreneurship in Turkey with giving special emphasis todistinguishing characteristics of successful femaleemployers. SILC dataset covers the 2007-2010 period. Thispaper focuses on employers due to its importance overown-account workers (OAW) in creating jobs and increasingthe impact of women in the economy. All tables and figure inthis paper make use of the SILC dataset. The paper documentsthat female employers are in minority in Turkey not onlyamong all working women but also among all employers in theeconomy. Moreover, female employers earn less than theirmale counterparts and their firms are generally smaller. Asfor their background, there is a low churning among femaleemployers and majority of new female employers aretransformed from inactivity and very few from wageemployment. The paper confirms the importance of universityeducation in closing gender gap. Proportional income gapbetween male and female employers is lowest among universitygraduates and highest among primary school and vocationalhigh school graduates. It is also noteworthy that femaleemployers are less educated than female full-time employersbut male employers are more educated than full-time maleemployees. Section one gives introduction. Section twopresents characteristics of female employers in comparisonto male employers and other female work groups. Sectionthree evaluates the success of female employers in terms ofincome they generate. Section four presents features ofsuccessful female employers. Section five discusses resultsand concludes.
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