Women's Economic Well-being Continues to Lag Behind Male Peers

This infographic shows how women's economic well-being continue to lag behind male peers despite advances for women in education and training.

View Infographic(PDF)
View Infographic(Image)

View Plain Text PDF

 





Ensuring women's economic security is a key step toward ensuring women's personal security and overall well-being. It is also important to the economic well-being of the country. Yet, women's economic well-being continues to lag behind their male peers despite advances for women in education and training.

  • 34% less: Women’s median employment income compared to men’s in 2011.
  • The employment rate for women (15yrs. & over) continues to be below that for men (15yrs. & over) = Women 58%, Men 66%.
This infographic emerged from the Issue-Based Newsletter 10: Gender Equality.

It's true that working part-time can be a personal preference, however, over the past 5 years, almost double the number of women (compared to men) state the reason they are working parttime is because of a lack of full-time jobs or business conditions.

Gender gaps that disadvantage women during their working years compromise their economic security in older age. For instance, older women have less income and a higher percentage of their income comes from government transfers (e.g., old age security, CPP, social assistance) than from market income (salaries, retirement income). Sources of retirement income for older women in 2008:

  • Market Income: Women 47%, Men 63%
  • Government transfers: Women 53%, Men 37%