WUNRN
WOMEN, WORK, & THE ECONOMY:
MACROECONOMIC GAINS FROM GENDER EQUITY
Direct Link to Full 32-Page
International Monetary Fund (IMF) 2013 Document:
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/sdn/2013/sdn1310.pdf
“Women make up a little over half the world’s population, but
their contribution to measured economic activity, growth, and well-being is far
below its potential, with serious macroeconomic consequences.Despite
significant progress in recent decades, labor markets across the world remain
divided along gender lines, and progress toward gender equality seems to have
stalled. Female labor force participation (FLFP) has remained lower than male
participation, women account for most unpaid work, and when women are employed
in paid work, they are overrepresented in the informal sector and among the
poor. They also face significant wage differentials vis-à-vis their male
colleagues. In many countries, distortions and discrimination in the labor
market restrict women’s options for paid work, and female representation in
senior positions and entrepreneurship remains low.”
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http://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_324645/lang--en/index.htm
GLOBAL WAGE REPORT 2014-2015 – ILO
Global wage growth stagnates, lags behind
pre-crisis rates. The latest ILO Global Wage Report warns of stalled wages in
many countries and points to the labour market as a driver of inequality.
Direct Link to ILO 12-Page Report Executive Summary:
Some groups suffer from
discrimination and wage penalties
The report shows that in almost
all countries studied there are wage gaps between
men and women as well as between
national and migrant workers. These gaps
arise for multiple and complex
reasons that differ from one country to another
and vary at different points of
the overall wage distribution. These wage gaps can
be divided into an “explained” part,
which is accounted for by observed human
capital and labour market
characteristics, and an “unexplained” part, which
captures wage discrimination and
includes characteristics (e.g. having children)
that should in principle have no
effect on wages. The report shows that if this
unexplained
wage penalty was eliminated, the
mean gender wage gap would actually
reverse in Brazil, Lithuania, the
Russian Federation, Slovenia and Sweden,
where the labour market
characteristics of the disadvantaged groups should result
in higher wages. It would also
nearly disappear in about half the countries in the
sample of developed economies.
A similar analysis is carried out
to compare the wages of migrants with
those of national workers,
showing that in various countries the mean wage gap
would reverse if the unexplained
part of the gap was eliminated. Among developed
economies, this is the case in
Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands,
Norway, Poland and Sweden. In
Chile, migrant workers earn more than their
national counterparts on average.
The report also finds a wage gap
between workers in the formal and the
informal economy; this is shown
in the report, for example, in wage gaps affecting
workers in the informal economy
for selected Latin American countries. As with
gender and migrant wage gaps, the
wage gap for workers in the informal economy
is generally lowest in the bottom
deciles and increases for higher wage earners.
In addition, the observable
labour market characteristics of informal economy
workers differ from workers in
the formal economy across all points of the wage
distribution and for all
countries (i.e. there is an explained gap across the entire
distribution). At the same time,
however, the unexplained part of the wage gap
remains significant.