NEWS - U.N. REPORT SAYS WOMEN STILL

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Subject: NEWS - U.N. REPORT SAYS WOMEN STILL EARN TWO-THIRDS OF MEN'S SALARIES 

U.N. REPORT SAYS WOMEN STILL EARN TWO-THIRDS OF MEN'S SALARIES 
UNITED NATIONS 21 October 1999 Sapa-AP

    In the last two decades, more women have secured paying jobs, but
they still earn two-thirds of what men make and often give up more than
half of their
    salaries to male family members, a U.N. report said Thursday. 

    The 1999 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development will
provide fodder for next year's General Assembly review of progress since
the 1995 U.N.
    women's conference. 

    The 75-page report was prepared by the U.N. Department of Economic
and Social Affairs - which compiled statistical and anecdotal evidence
from trade and
    labor organizations, U.N. agencies and voluntary organizations. 

    Angela King, the U.N. special adviser on gender issues and
advancement of women, said the issue of women and labor has been «very
neglected» and the
    report was aimed at targeting economic disparities. 

    «Women - universally - are oppressed, deprived and are discriminated
against in the economic field,» she told a news conference launching the
report.
    «Without economic empowerment, women cannot rise to decision
making.» 

    The good news is that, overall, more women have access to jobs, the
report said. For example, in 1978, Bangladesh had only four garment
factories; by
    1995 it had 2,400 factories employing 1.2 million workers. Ninety
percent were women. 

    The Dominican Republic, Indonesia, Mauritius, the Philippines, South
Korea, Taiwan and Tunisia also showed hikes in the number of female
workers. 

    But while there were more labor opportunities for women, the report
said governments weren't necessarily able to provide benefits for the
added female
    workers, such as unemployment insurance. 

    The survey, which is published every five years, showed that in the
United States, El Salvador and Sri Lanka, wage gaps between men and
women have
    narrowed. 

    The reason: increases in trade and international competition in the
last 20 years eroded well-paying blue collar wages in industries where
men were once the
    well-entrenched insiders, the report said. 

    But in countries such as Japan, Singapore, Taiwan and Myanmar, wage
gaps between men and women had widened. 

    «In developed countries the shift in employment has gone from
manufacturing jobs to more services-related jobs,» said Yakin Erturk,
director of the Division
    for the Advancement of Women in the U.N. Department for Economic and
Social Affairs. 

    «In developing countries the shift has gone from agricultural jobs
to the manufacturing sector. The wage gaps have tended to be wider
between men and
    women in the manufacturing sector,» she said. 

    The report also said women suffered most in the Asian economic
crisis. 

    As inflation, the diminished value of local currencies and trade
imbalances crippled Asian economies in 1997, the first to be fired were
women, the report
    said. It said firms employing many women - mainly export-related -
were hardest hit by the economic decline. 

    The report also showed that in some countries, particularly in the
developing world, women still relinquish much of their earnings to men.
In rural areas,
    women are hired by male recruiters who, in turn, pay wages to male
members of the women's family. 

    The report also shows that in places like Africa - where women set
up curbside stands selling everything from sun-dried worms to stereo
systems - the
    number of jobs in the «informal sector» has grown rapidly. 

    In much of Africa, more than one-third of women in non-agricultural
jobs work in the informal sector and rates reach as high as 72 percent
in Zambia and 65
    percent in Gambia. 


source: gopher://gopher.anc.org.za/00/anc/newsbrief/1999/news1022 
processed Fri 22 Oct 1999 10:28 SAST.