Title page

Contents

Abstract 1

1. Introduction 5

2. Methodology 8

2.1. Sample construction 8

2.2. Searches and selection of studies 9

2.3. Study extraction 10

2.4. Standardization of effect sizes 11

2.5. Meta-analysis and meta-regression 12

3. Results 14

3.1. Sample description 14

3.2. Assessing publication bias 19

3.3. Pooled effect sizes 20

3.4. Meta-regression results 22

3.5. Cost-benefit results 24

4. Discussion and policy implications 25

References 30

Appendix A. Supplementary information and analysis 35

Appendix B. Scopus search strings in eligible languages 65

TABLE 1. Sample characteristics 18

TABLE 2. RVE Meta-regression results across all outcomes by publication, implementation and effect characteristics 23

FIGURE 1. PRISMA flow diagram 15

FIGURE 2. Geographical distribution of overall effect sizes 16

FIGURE 3. Pooled effects by SSN type (top) and outcome indicator (bottom) 21

TABLE A1. Summary of related meta-analyses on women's economic achievement and agency outcomes (2013-2023) 37

TABLE A2. Inclusion and exclusion criteria 38

TABLE A3. Revised Joanna Briggs Institute quality assessment for experimental studies 40

TABLE A4. Indicator definitions for characteristics at the publication, intervention and effect level 41

TABLE A5. Publication details ordered by country of study and year of publication 43

TABLE A6. Pooled effect sizes for all social safety net interventions 50

TABLE A7. Pooled effect sizes across all outcomes by different social safety net interventions 50

TABLE A8. Pooled effect sizes for social safety net interventions by different outcome categories of economic achievements and agency 51

TABLE A9. Pooled effect sizes for economic achievement and agency domains by social safety net intervention types 52

TABLE A10. Summary of cost-benefit analysis in included studies 53

FIGURE A1. Conceptual framework linking social safety nets to women's agency and economic achievements 35

FIGURE A2. Number of publications over time 35

FIGURE A3. Doi plot assessing publication bias 36

FIGURE A4. Violin plots for combined effects by social safety net type 36