Empowerment of women and economic growth

More and more empirical studies are demonstrating that promoting gender equality improves economy. UN Women –the international organization focused on standing up for women and girls’ rights– has recollected the outcome of some researches that associate empowerment of women and economic growth.

One of the first important facts is that, when working women figures increase, economies grow. According to some studies carried out in OECD member and non-member countries, an increase in women taking part on labour force –or a reduction on gender gap in terms of labour force–causes a faster economic growth.

In addition, spending resources on improving women’s and girls’ education contributes to a greater economic growth. In this way, a higher education level within this group is responsible for the 50% of OECD countries’ economic growth during the last 50 years. Besides, more than half of the girls from this last figure had access to higher education levels and to achieve a greater equality in terms of years of training between men and women.

Another element to take into account is wage gap between men and women. It is estimated that women could increase their income up to 76% globally if wage and labour gender gaps would disappear. It is also calculated that this would represent a global value of 17 trillion USD.

Lastly, empowering women on management and responsibility positions is also positive. Companies take great advantage from increasing opportunities for women on management jobs, and this is something that has demonstrated to improve organizational effectiveness. It is estimated that companies where 3 or more women occupy management positions are recording a higher performance in every aspect of organizational effectiveness.