If you’re a woman wondering how long you’ll have to wait for the same economic opportunities as your male counterparts, the answer could be more than two and half centuries, according to the World Economic Forum.
The economic gender gap will take 257 years to close, the WEF said, even more than the 202 years it
There are also large inequalities in almost all of the fastest-growing job clusters of the future, with fewer female workers in cloud computing, engineering, data and AI, and product development.
“To get to parity in the next decade instead of the next two centuries, we will need to mobilize resources, focus leadership attention and commit to targets,” said Saadia Zahidi, head of the WEF Centre for the New Economy and Society.
For its part, the forum has committed to at least double the current percentage of
The report did contain some positive developments: the global gender gap — which accounts for health, education and politics alongside economics — has improved, thanks largely to a greater number of
The WEF does offer some reason for hope for faster progress. In many countries, increased political empowerment corresponds with higher numbers of women in senior roles, indicating there could be a “role model effect” that would help close economic disparities.