The Global Gender Gap Report 2006

My first posting... welcome to my blog!

From a couple of days ago (Nov. 26 I think). Please forward around widely.

In all a very interesting read!

The U.S. is 22 on the list by the way.

Julio

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http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Gender%20Gap/index.htm

The Global Gender Gap Report 2006

Watch an interview with author, Saadia Zahidi, Economist and Head, Women Leaders Programme

The Nordic countries, Sweden (1), Norway (2), Finland (3) and Iceland (4), top the latest Gender Gap Index. Germany (5), the Philippines (6), New Zealand (7), Denmark (8), the United Kingdom (9) and Ireland (10) complete the top 10 countries with the smallest "gender gap".

The Global Gender Gap Report 2006 covers all current and candidate European Union countries, 20 from Latin America and the Caribbean, over 20 from sub-Saharan Africa and 10 from the Arab world. Together, the 115 economies cover over 90% of the world’s population. The index mainly uses publicly available "hard data" indicators drawn from international organizations and some qualitative information from the Forum’s own Executive Opinion Survey. The Global Gender Gap Report 2006 includes an innovative new methodology including detailed profiles of each economy that provide insight into the economic, legal and social aspects of the gender gap. The Report measures the size of the gender gap in four critical areas of inequality between men and women:

1. Economic participation and opportunity – outcomes on salaries, participation levels and access to high-skilled employment

2. Educational attainment – outcomes on access to basic and higher level education

3. Political empowerment – outcomes on representation in decision-making structures

4. Health and survival – outcomes on life expectancy and sex ratio

This year marks an important progression in the Report’s methodology, with the adoption of a new tool that focuses on the relative size of the gender gap rather than levels of women’s empowerment and access. The new methodology is the result of collaboration between Ricardo Hausmann, Director of the Center for International Development at Harvard University, Laura D. Tyson, Dean of the London Business School and Saadia Zahidi, Head of the World Economic Forum’s Women Leaders Programme.