Motherhood, Entrepreneurship, and Credit Terms: Evidence from Rural Thailand and Vietnam

Gender disparities in rural credit markets persist, yet evidence remains limited on how caregiving responsibilities and entrepreneurship-related information signals jointly shape loan contracts. Using nine survey waves (2007–2022) of the Thailand-Vietnam Socio-Economic Panel (TVSEP) covering rural households (31,642 household-year observations; 9,068 business-year observations), we study two core contractual margins, loan amount and loan maturity, among household-years with realised borrowing. We estimate linear models with province-by-year fixed effects and household-clustered inference, complemented by matching and within-household panel specifications. We document persistent disadvantages for female and mother household heads, who receive shorter maturities and smaller loans on average; these gaps are concentrated among women without businesses, while gaps attenuate among female and mother entrepreneurs. Cross-country evidence indicates that penalties remain pronounced in Thailand but are often statistically indistinguishable for female entrepreneurs in Vietnam. The paper’s novelty lies in its intersectional lens linking gender, motherhood and entrepreneurship; its integrated analysis of two distinct credit margins; and its evidence and comparative perspective on how entrepreneurship can mitigate (but does not always eliminate) gender- and caregiving-related disadvantages in rural Southeast Asian credit markets.