Australian women most economically advanced

In a week of contradicting information, a new report has found that Australian women are the world’s most economically advanced. This report comes in the wake of the debate over sexism and misogyny in Canberra, as well as the Australian Council of Social Services’s (ACOSS) report which showed that more than 2.25 million Australians are living in poverty, and the Global Wealth report by Credit Suisse which found that Australians are the richest people in the world.

The study, undertaken by the international consulting and management firm Booz & Company, looked at a number of factors. The report compared the performance of 128 countries in providing women with:

• Primary, secondary and tertiary education
• Equal pay for equal work
• Non-discrimination policies
• Access to childcare
• Property ownership rights
• Ability to access credit

Australia ranked first out of the 128 countries, followed by Norway, Sweden, Finland and New Zealand. The countries at the bottom of the list were Yemen, Pakistan, Sudan and Chad.

The report also looked at wage equality, what percentage of the workforce was made up by woman and whether women held high ranking positions, such as managers, senior business leaders and politicians.

Read the original report from Booz & Company.
 

Comment – A little bit backward

Australian women are the most economically empowered in the world (according to this report). We, as a country, are now the benchmark. Australian women are some of the best educated in the world – more than 50 per cent of all university graduates in Australia are women.

But on average in Australia women earn 17.5 per cent less than their male counterparts, female graduates earn $2000 per annum less upon entering the workforce than male graduates and only 3 per cent of ASX 200 CEOs are women. And that all looks so much worse now that we know we’re as good as it gets.

I can understand there being fewer women in the workforce than men. Internationally women are the primary caregivers for children and the elderly, which makes it more difficult to build a career. But to pay those women who are working less than a man who does exactly the same job seems, to this woman, pretty backward.

Is this just the way the world works? Is it good that Australian women are the world’s most economically empowered, or sad that we’re as good as it gets? And have you ever experienced gender discrimination in the workplace?