WELFARE REGIMES AS STRUCTURAL MODERATORS: IMMIGRANT WOMEN'S LABOUR MARKET DISADVANTAGE ACROSS THE EU27 AND IMPLICATIONS FOR SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE

When gender and migration status intersect in European labour markets, the resulting employment disadvantage exceeds the sum of its parts. Across the 27 member states of the European Union, immigrant women's mean employment rate stands at 59.6%, trailing immigrant men by 14.3 percentage points and native women by 4.6 pp. Drawing on Eurostat Labour Force Survey panel data for all EU27 member states (2015–2024) and the OECD International Migration Database (2023), this study conducts a systematic three-way comparison and evaluates four theoretical frameworks: the double disadvantage hypothesis, intersectionality theory, the selective migration hypothesis, and welfare regime theory. Welch t-tests and country fixed-effects OLS regression confirm that the immigrant gender employment gap (14.3 pp; Cohen's d = −1.96, p < .001) is approximately 1.75 times larger than the native gender gap (8.1 pp), consistent with an intersectional interpretation. Between-country heterogeneity is extreme (I² = 98.8%), tracing a welfare regime gradient. A "universalist paradox" is identified in Social Democratic regimes, where the highest absolute employment rates for immigrant women coincide with the widest immigrant–native gaps. Findings challenge additive models of compound disadvantage and carry direct implications for social work practice, professional education, and policy advocacy across differentiated welfare state contexts.