Helping women win in the workplace is not a zero-sum game. Wealth inequality is also a story of gender inequality, and the story is not a happy one.
Take the gender pay gap, for instance. Data in 2021 showed women were being paid a median hourly rate 10.2 per cent less than their male colleagues, nearly a percentage point higher than the 9.3 per cent gap reported in 2018.
While the gender pay gap is about compensation, the gender wealth gap is the difference in overall net worth between men and women. Worldwide, men own 50 per cent more wealth than women and taken together, the wealth of the richest 22 men in the world equals all of the wealth of the women in Africa.
The pandemic has further put women in a double bind. More women than men have lost their jobs during this time and, due to a cut in household expenses, have been expected to take on more unpaid care work, 60 per cent more to be exact.
Besides being paid less at work, women find it more challenging to hang on to their money, much less grow it.
Why has it been so challenging?
It’s not a helping hand if it doesn’t pull you up
It often feels that initiatives targeting women are useful but ultimately unhelpful when it comes to empowering women and addressing the gaps in gender equality at work.
First, programmes with a mentoring slant presume that there is something inherently lacking in the way women are.
Girls and women outperform boys and men at every level in school, so it’s not because we are undereducated. It’s not our work ethics nor the quality of our work that need to be fixed either.
Hence, suggesting mentoring to address gender gaps looks only at one side of the equation.
Second, the work of measuring up shouldn’t rest solely on the shoulders of women.
Institutional biases should be addressed and eliminated. In this respect, managers and companies have to participate in programmes designed to change their mindset and teach them to develop better, fairer policies around hiring and promotion.
Also Read: A woman among women: 27 female-led startups in SEA that is going places
Teaching women to kick the ball isn’t going to be enough if no one is taking those who keep moving the goalpost to the task. No amount of mentoring and training will matter if none of them leads to more women getting promoted and recognised at work.
Not a good look in front of HR
For Agnes Tay*, 42-year-old regional marketing manager, being a woman at the workplace feels like she’s in a game she can never win at. She explains that the discrimination that women face is a lot more insidious.
“As a woman, it’s already a challenge trying to smash through that glass ceiling. Then as you get older, you are made to feel like you’re past your ‘sell-by’ date because younger colleagues call you ‘aunty’ and tease you for being ‘like my mother’,” she says.
“While the teasing may not be malicious, it sets a tone, and your bosses might then think, ‘Maybe she’s not a go-getter, she’s probably thinking about retiring,’ and off he goes to hire a man for that senior role you’ve been eyeing.
“They don’t say this, but you can tell from how your ideas are only cool enough if your younger colleagues like them, how your concerns are only valid if another man voices it too, how you are never right until another man says you are. Your boss second-guesses your every decision and asks you to back it up with evidence but readily accepts those suggested by younger colleagues or by men.”
While Agnes has thought of bringing it up to HR, she believes it would backfire on her.
“Every boss has the right to ask you to support your work with evidence, but it’s the exceptions that they make for other people that makes you wonder if your suspicions of discrimination are right or you’re just plain jealous, and that’s never a good look in front of HR.”
When you steal a woman’s future, you steal her wealth
Holding women back at work has financial consequences. When you steal our futures, you steal our wealth.
Women bear a double-discrimination burden in the workplace, with age combined with gender. We are more likely than men to experience age discrimination in the workplace, including being passed over for jobs and promotions.
Women of colour experience this bias at even higher rates. Women suffer occupational segregation, meaning they are underrepresented in higher-wage managerial positions and overrepresented in the lower-wage service sector.
The result is that we are less likely to receive executive benefits like company cars, expense accounts and having the company take care of our rent and children’s private school fees.
To-do list, not wishlist
First, International Women’s Day is more than just a day where we get everyone to do performative things like posing for a picture and putting a stalk of rose on every woman employee’s desk. Don’t let the gestures trick you into thinking you’ve done right by your female employees.
Second, we need to unconditionally support a woman’s ambition and advocate for other women until the playing field is levelled.
While some may say, “I don’t want to be hired for a job simply because I tick a diversity box”, it is essential to know that if we don’t push for the change we want, we will never see that change happen.
Also, Read: Women in tech have leaned in enough. This is what we should do instead
Third, companies need to train managers to recognise and remove their unconscious bias regarding hiring, compensation, and promotion.
If your company has a policy where female employees are encouraged to sign up for mentoring sessions to improve their chances of promotion, ask if it does the same to the men.
Finally, two-thirds of women say they get stressed about money at least once a week, so employers stand to benefit when they prioritise their employees’ financial wellbeing and offer financial literacy and retirement planning as a benefit.
Help your female employees get better control of their money by exposing them to apps like Revolut, where they can build up an investment portfolio using spare change rounded up from their card payments and learn to make better investment decisions through market updates that can be found in-app.
This is not a zero-sum game where men stand to lose when women benefit. A 2018 McKinsey report on diversity shared that increased gender diversity improves a company’s profitability by 21 per cent. What is good for women is ultimately good for everyone.
*First name changed to protect privacy
–
Editor’s note: e27 aims to foster thought leadership by publishing views from the community. Share your opinion by submitting an article, video, podcast, or infographic.
Join our e27 Telegram group, FB community, or like the e27 Facebook page
Image Credit: lightfieldstudios
The post When you steal a woman’s future, you steal her wealth appeared first on e27.
