Women Still Face Gender Bias Despite Equality Movements, UN Finds

Gender bias continues to hold back women as they strive for equal status with men. This is according to a new United Nations (UN) report. Indeed, nearly 9 in 10 people globally still hold some bias against women, the UN said. This is even with equality movements like #MeToo and Time’s Up.  

The UN’s Gender Social Norms Index regularly measures such biases against women. For this report, the UN sent questions to people in 85% of countries around the globe. The UN asked about their views on gender roles in four areas. Those were: political, educational, economic, and physical integrity.     

“Half of people worldwide still believe men make better political leaders than women,” the UN report said. "More than 40% believe men make better business executives than women." 

Nearly 1 in 4 people worldwide said there are times it's OK for a man to beat his wife. 28% think a college education is more important for men than for women.  

In the past 30 years, another area hasn't seen much progress. That's women holding positions of power. The percentage of women who are heads of state has stayed at about 10% since 1995, for example. Fifty-nine nations now say women have passed men in education. But the income gap for women in those countries is 39%.       

Women are held back, especially, because they do a great deal of work for which they are not paid, the UN said. The report’s authors said that compared to men, women spend roughly over six times as much time on unpaid care work. This includes looking after people who are sick or elderly.    

Photo by Linkedin courtesy of Unsplash.

Reflect: Gender bias refers to a person receiving different treatment based on the person's gender identity. What parts of society do you think are most affected by gender bias?