#GAReads | Women in Work Index 2019
International Women’s Day 2019 marks yet another year of continued steps to improve the representation and welfare of women in the world of work. From the first world leader taking maternity leave, to the overwhelming response to #metoo, working women everywhere are increasingly asserting their right to be respected and treated fairly at work.
However, women in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) still face significant challenges and inequalities in the workplace. The pay gap persists and women are still under-represented in corporate leadership, with womenaccounting for only one-in-five of board seats in the largest publicly-listed companies in the OECD.
Clearly, there is still a long way to go before we can achieve a gender-equal workplace. The Women in Work Index shows that while progress continues to be made across 33 OECD countries, the pace of progress is slow. But there is a huge prize at stake from accelerating progress: Improving female participation in work across the OECD could boost OECD GDP by US$6 trillion, while closing the gender pay gap could boost GDP by US$2 trillion