Women’s Equality Day
Many groups around world are celebrating Women’s Equality Day, but why?
If you are a European woman, maybe it would be better to put your celebrations on hold! Even better, you may be able to do something that would really be worth celebrating.
While Europe is perceived as a global leader in equality, we seem to be a long way from delivering often repeated promises, mainly from men. of doing better in the future.
By analysing data it has been shown that from 2005 to 2012, women are only halfway to equality with men, and progress has stagnated for the last 11 years. Men continue to be over-represented in political and economic decision making: processes with over 75% of parliamentarians and 84% of corporate board members in Europe are men. The monthly earnings gender pay gap has decreased from 22% to 20%, and women’s full-time employment rate has increased slightly.
While we could consider many more examples of the mostly unimproved position of women, maybe we can consider one of the founding documents of the EU which for an ever reducing number of women occured during their lifetime, the Treaty of Rome.
In the 1957, article 119 of the Treaty of Rome stated:
“each Member State shall ensure that the principle of equal pay for male and female workers for equal work or work of equal value is applied”.
As we head for the 60th anniversary of this event, how long should we wait before we can organise celebrations for actual equality!