Gender Discrimination In Society

GENDER DISCRIMINATION

Kofi Annan, the 7th Secretary General of the United Nations states that “Gender equality is more than a goal in itself. It is a pre-condition for meeting the challenge of reducing poverty, promoting sustainable development and building good governance”. However, gender equality has been difficult to achieve across the globe with gender discrimination being the order of the day.

In order to get a clearer understanding of gender discrimination it is essential to know what the terms gender and discrimination mean and why gender is not the same as sex since there has been a misconception of the two terms (sex and gender). Sex refers to one’s biological classification whereas gender has to do with the social definitions attached

This indicates that gender discrimination is socially determined and can be changed by the proper and perpetuated efforts although much progress has been made in closing the gender gap in areas such as education, healthcare, employment and government. It is worth knowing the origin and universality of women subordination is an important dimension of gender and development as it relates to the position of women in different societies. Some men and society in general still see women as inferior and therefore do not consider the role of women as necessary in the socio-economic development process. It is therefore against this background that this paper focuses on the pay gap between males and females in the United Kingdom (UK) as a means of discriminating against women. One must also know that inequalities has been a key feature across diverse systems. Wilkinson and Pickett (2009) in their book titled, The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Always Do Better reveal that the amount income inequality in a country is crucial noting the levels of trust between members of the public are lower in countries where income differences are larger citing the trust level in the Scandinavian countries and Netherland as high and that of the very unequal countries like UK as low. The level of

The gender pay gap is the difference between male and female earnings. This difference is expressed as a percentage of male earnings. According to the Fawcett Society, there is no one cause of the gender pay gap in the UK. Stating that factors such as discrimination, undervaluing roles predominantly done by women dominance of men in best paid positions and unequal caring responsibilities are to be blamed. They add that the pay gap for full time workers is 13.9% and that with the current rate of progress of the pay gap closing (2011-2015) it will take over 50 years to achieve a pay gap closure for full time workers. While the overall definition of gender pay gap is widely shared, its exact measurement varies. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) use the median (middle data point) hourly earnings excluding overtime to calculate the gap, while the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), along with inter alia, the OECD, prefer to use the mean (central tendency) hourly earnings with each having its own advantages and