In 2024, 46.4 percent of working-age women were employed, compared to 69.5 percent of men. In over 30 years, the gender employment gap has narrowed by only 4 percentage points, with high-income and lower-middle income countries exhibiting the largest reduction. At this pace of progress, achieving gender parity in employment rates globally will take over 190 years.

In the last two decades, 2004 to 2024, in annual earnings per worker, the gap has reduced but women globally still earn significantly less on an average than men, work fewer paid hours and are overrepresented in informal employment in low- and lower-middle income countries. Collectively, in 2024, the labour income earned by all women worldwide was barely over half of that earned by all men.

Globally in 2024, women worked approximately 6hours and 25 minutes less per week than men in paid employment. However, women spend 3.2 times more hours on unpaid care work than men. Excessive and unequal care responsibilities keep 708 million women outside the labour force globally.

As of 2023, women hold just 30 percent of managerial positions globally, a modest improvement over the past two decades. Low-income countries have demonstrated significant progress, with women’s representation in management rising from 24.7 to 36.5 percent.

Women are 1.6 times more likely than men to experience sexual violence and harassment in the world of work, with young and migrant women being at greater risk. It is one of the greatest inequalities that hinders progress, but there are many others too, forming multiple compounding disadvantages. Women face these in entering, remaining, and progressing in employment and obtaining decent work.

Gender gaps in employment, as measured by differences in the employment-to-population ratio by gender, remain large across the world. In 2024, only 46.4 per cent of working-age women worldwide were employed, compared to 69.5 percent of men – a gap of 23.1 percentage points, as against 27.1 percent in 1991.

Thus, the gap reduced by only 4 percent, but no on account of progress in women employment, but was driven primarily by a 6 percent decline in the male employment rate. It was not a meaningful gain for women, since women’s global employment rate decreased by 2.3 percent during the last three decade. The progress remains too slow, and achieving gender parity in employment at the global level would take more than 190 years.

In 2024, high-income countries exhibited the smallest gender gaps in employment 13.2 percent, primarily due to women’s employment-to-population ratio increasing from 46.8 percent in 1991 to 51.9 percent in 2024. In contrast, in low- and upper-middle-income countries, women’s employment rates decreased considerably, by 10.8 percentage points and 7.6 percentage points, respectively.

In 2024, the employment gap between young men and young women aged 15-24 stood at 12.7 percentage points. While substantial, this gap was notably smaller than the 26-percentage point difference observed for adults aged 25 and above.

Among migrants, significant gender gaps persist, with migrant women having an employment-to-population ratio of just 48.1 per cent, compared to 72.8per cent for migrant men.

Over the past two decades, the gender gap in youth employment has narrowed by just two percentage points, with employment rates declining by 6 percentage points for young women and 8.1 for young men. Yet, while the share of young men not in employment, education or training (NEET) has remained stable, young women’s NEET rate has dropped by 4.6 percentage points globally since 2005, reflecting a stronger shift among young women towards participation in education and training - from 31.3 per cent in 2005 to 41.8per cent in 2024.

Considering both wage workers and the self-employed, as well as gender gaps in paid working hours, the gaps in average annual earnings between female and male workers are substantial. In 2024, female workers earned just 77.4 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts.

Employees with disabilities earn 12 percent less per hour than employees without disabilities. Women with disabilities face additional challenges. A sample of 14 countries for which the average pay can be disaggregated by sex and disability, women with disabilities earn 6 percent less on average than men with disabilities in high-income countries, and 5 percent less in low- and middle-income countries.

Women are more likely than men to engage in informal work in low and lower-middle income countries. It is a serious matter since globally, most workers are engaged in informal employment, often lacking social protection, decent working conditions and collective representation. The informal employment rate in 2024was higher for men (60 percent) than for women (55 percent).

However, this gender pattern does not hold across all regions or country income groups. In low-income and lower-middle-income countries, where informality is far more common, women have higher informal employment rates than men by 4.9 and 2.3 percentage points, respectively. Conversely, in upper-middle-income and high-income countries, men have higher informal employment rates than women by around 2 percentage points. Although informal employment shares are decreasing, informal employment has risen in absolute terms. Total informal employment has increased by 335 million people since 2004, reaching 2.0billion in 2024.

As of 2023, women hold only 30 percent of managerial positions globally, highlighting a persistent gap from the desired parity. Nevertheless, this represents an improvement of approximately 3.5 percentage points over the past two decades. Notably, low-income countries have demonstrated significant progress, with women's representation in management rising from 24.7 to 36.5 percent. The Americas are progressing towards gender parity, with women holding 40.3 percent of management roles.

Beyond women’s position in management and entrepreneurship, gender segregation across various occupations is persistent and rooted in prevailing gender stereotypes and social norms. Women are overrepresented in occupations related to nursing, childcare and cleaning, with women holding 75 percent or more of these positions. In contrast, men overwhelmingly dominate at 98 percent in fields such as heavy truck drivers and machinery repairs. This horizontal occupational segregation is also reflected within managerial roles. For instance, in long-term care services more than 86 per cent of managers are women, and conversely women represent only 10.8 percent of all construction managers.

Over 80 percent of migrant women were employed in the services sector compared to 60.8 percent of migrant men, with a much smaller share of migrant women employed in the industry sector (12.2 percent) as compared to migrant men (31.7 percent).

Around the world, more than 16 billion hours per day are devoted to unpaid care work, with women and girls engaging in approximately 76 percent of this time. In other words, women work 3.2 times more in unpaid care work than men. Among the 23 countries for which repeated time use survey data is available, between1997 and 2012, women’s time spent on unpaid care decreased by only 15 minutes per day, from 4 hours and23 minutes, while men’s time spent on unpaid care fell, rather than increased, by 8 minutes, from 2 hours and 35minutes, reflecting persisting gender norms. In 2023, Care responsibilities account for 45 per cent - or 708 million- of women outside the labour force globally and for only 5 percent of men, or about 40 million.

In 2023, globally, 63.2 percent of men above statutory retirement age receive a contributory pension, compared to only 49.2 percent of women. As for Artificial Intelligence and automation, women are twice more likely than men to be affected by automation (3.7 percent of women compared to 1.4 percent of men), with the impact even more pronounced in high-income countries (7.8 percent of women compared to 2.9 percent of men). (IPA Service)