Gender equality report: not one country has fully closed the gap yet

[umbertino]

The UK falls eight places in rankings measuring gender equality worldwide, with Nordic countries such as Iceland and Sweden continuing to come out on top

 

 

• George Arnett
•  
• theguardian.com, Tuesday 28 October 2014 07.49 GMT

 

 

 

It will take 81 years for the worldwide gender gap to close if progress continues at the current rate, according to the latest report by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

 

Women currently have 60% of the standing of men worldwide - just four percentage points up on 2006 when WEF started the report measuring female economic participation, education, health and political involvement.

 

A gender gap is not necessarily a measurement of women’s quality of life in general, for example issues like abortion are likely to be excluded, it is about measuring the gap in various sectors of society between men and women.

 

Not one country has closed its overall gender gap since 2006 but all five of the Nordic countries have closed more than 80% of it and they now sit at the top of the rankings. Iceland (1), Finland (2), Norway (3) and Sweden (4) are now followed by Denmark which rose three places to fifth this year.

 

Nicaragua went up by four places to sixth, while Rwanda came into the rankings for the first time at seventh. Ten countries from Latin America made the top 50, although there were significant declines for both Brazil and Mexico, and sub-Saharan Africa registered three in the top 20.

 

In terms of the metrics the global gender gap is at its least severe in health and survival (96%) followed by educational attainment (94%). The gap for political empowerment is the worst of any of the metrics at 21% - meaning that women are represented in about two out of 10 political positions - although, at the same time, the WEF says this is the area in which the world has shown the most improvement since 2006.

 

The UK has dropped out of the top twenty most gender equal societies to 26th - down six places on last year’s report. Although the country has the third highest length of maternity leave at 273 calendar days, it comes 48th for labour force participation and 66th for estimated earned income. It has also fallen behind others in educational attainment (32) and, health and survival (94).

 

To see the full rankings visualised and to read the report in full, click on the map below ( check link for all charts).

 

 

 

 

 

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/oct/28/not-one-country-has-fully-closed-gender-gap-yet-report-shows

[dog53]

Hey they want equality then they need to start raising the toilet seat when their done. 

[R2D2]

Dog that has been my pet pev since my mum slapped me around for walking away with out lowering that thing that here and my sister used. It was a big deal to them. I thought I was being considerate for raising it up and not peing on it.

[gymrat76541]

Got news for you!

It ain't ever going to happen! Works both ways in life - how many attractive women get jobs because of their looks?

There are even businesses who hire based on appearance: drug companies, hotels, night clubs, strip clubs, etc, etc...