Francesca Bettio is professor of economics at the University of Siena, Italy. She graduated from the University of Bologna and holds a Master of Science from the London School of Economics and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Cambridge, UK. Her main areas of expertise are labor economics, population studies and gender economics. Her doctoral dissertation - which was published in English - offered the first economic account of female work and wages in Italy dating back to early industrialization. She is the author or co-author of more than sixty publications including books, articles and research monographs on topics ranging from long-term and cyclical patterns of female employment and wage differentials to discrimination and occupational segregation, fertility in Mediterranean countries, intra-household bargaining, care work and sex work. Her latest publications concern, respectively, the labor market impact of the economic crisis in European countries and the measurement of gender gaps in pension income. As one of the editors and founding member of the portal www.inGenere.it, she regularly contributes short web articles. Prof. Bettio has a long record of collaborating with the European Commission as an expert on female employment, and she is currently lead coordinator of the European Network of Experts on Gender Equality (ENEGE: www.enege.eu ).