Gender inequality refers to gender specific disparities in access to opportunities, resources, rights, and protections. Where gender inequality is present, it is usually women and girls who are disadvantaged and marginalized. Gender inequality weakens men and women in many areas, such as health, education, and business life. While many regions have advanced toward greater gender equality, no countries are considered to be truly gender equal.
Sex differences
Biology Natural differences exist between the sexes based on biological and anatomic factors, mostly differing reproductive roles. These biological differences include chromosomes and hormonal differences.Wood, Julia. Gendered Lives. 6th. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2005. There is also a natural difference in the relative physical strengths (on average) of the sexes, both in the lower body and more pronouncedly in the upper-body. Men, on average, are taller, which provides both advantages and disadvantages. Women, on average, live significantly longer than men, though it is not clear to what extent this is a biological difference. Men have larger lung volumes and more circulating blood cells and clotting factors, while women have more circulating white blood cells and produce antibodies faster. Differences such as these are hypothesized to be an adaptation allowing for sexual specialization.
Psychology Prenatal hormone exposure influences the extent to which a person exhibits typical masculine or feminine traits. Negligible differences between males and females exist in general intelligence. Men have been found to exhibit greater risk taking tendencies than women. Men are also more likely than women to be aggressive, a trait influenced by prenatal and possibly current androgen exposure.Carlson, N. 'Hormonal Control of Aggressive Behavior' Chapter 11 in [Physiology of Behavior],2013, Pearson Education Inc. It has been theorized that these differences combined with physical differences are an adaptation representing sexual division of labour. A second theory proposes sex differences in intergroup aggression represent adaptations in male aggression to allow for territory, resource and mate acquisition. Females are (on average) more empathetic than males, though this does not mean that any given woman is more empathetic than any given man. Men have an increased visuospatial and verbal memory over women. One study by three psychologists, Daniel Voyer, Susan D. Voyer, and Jean Saint-Aubin examined visuospatial working memory differences in different sexes. They found that men outperformed women when tested on the basis of visuospatial working memory tasks. These changes are influenced by the male sex hormone testosterone, which increases visuospatial memory in both genders when administered. While studies about the increase of these abilities that result from testosterone production differ throughout age groups and genders, one study found that high circulating levels in testosterone in men decreased males visuospatial performance while in females it increased their performance.
From birth, males and females are socialized differently, and experience different environments throughout their lives. Due to societal influence, gender often greatly influences many major characteristics in life; such as personality. Males and females are led on different paths due to the influences of gender role expectations and gender role stereotypes often before they are able to choose for themselves. For instance, in Western societies, the colour blue and the colour pink are commonly associated with boys and girls respectively (though this was not so before the 20th century). Boys are often given toys that are associated with traditional masculine roles, such as machines and trucks. Girls are often given toys related to traditional feminine roles, such as dolls, dresses, and dollhouses. These influences by parents or other adult figures in the child's life encourage them to fit into these roles. This tends to affect personality, career paths, or relationships. Throughout life, males and females are seen as two very different species who have very different personalities and should stay on separate paths.
Researcher Janet Hyde found that, although much research has traditionally focused on the differences between the genders, they are actually more alike than different, which is a position proposed by the gender similarities hypothesis.
In the workplace
Income disparities linked to job stratification
Across the board, a number of industries are stratified across the genders. This is the result of a variety of factors. These include differences in education choices, preferred job and industry, work experience, number of hours worked, and breaks in employment (such as for bearing and raising children). Men also typically go into higher paid and higher risk jobs when compared to women. These factors result in 60% to 75% difference between men's and women's average aggregate wages or salaries, depending on the source. Various explanations for the remaining 25% to 40% have been suggested, including women's lower willingness and ability to negotiate salary and sexual discrimination. According to the European Commission direct discrimination only explains a small part of gender wage differences. According to the International Labour Organisation, women continue to be paid around 20% less than males worldwide.
On average, women represented 37.8% of all agricultural workers in 2021; this share is above 50% in 22 countries, most of them in Africa. Women and men working in agriculture might have different employment status. Generally, the women employed in agriculture are more likely to be engaged as contributing family workers whereas men are more likely to be engaged on their own account as workers generating an income. In addition, women often spend more time than men on activities such as food processing and food preparation for the household, child and elder care, water and fuel collection and other unpaid household duties. Significant gender inequalities exist in farm ownership in 2025, with women in 43 out of 49 countries with available data less likely than men to own or have secure rights to agricultural land. When women do have secure land rights, they increase investment in soil conservation, have greater crop diversity and improved household food security.
In the United States, the average female's unadjusted annual salary has been cited as 78% of that of the average male. However, multiple studies from OECD, AAUW, and the US Department of Labor have found that pay rates between males and females varied by 5–6.6% or, females earning 94 cents to every dollar earned by their male counterparts, when wages were adjusted to different individual choices made by male and female workers in college major, occupation, working hours, and maternal/parental leave. The remaining 6% of the gap has been speculated to originate from deficiency in salary negotiating skills and sexual discrimination.
Human capital theories refer to the education, knowledge, training, experience, or skill of a person which makes them potentially valuable to an employer. This has historically been understood as a cause of the gendered wage gap but is no longer a predominant cause as women and men in certain occupations tend to have similar education levels or other credentials. Even when such characteristics of jobs and workers are controlled for, the presence of women within a certain occupation leads to lower wages. This earnings discrimination is considered to be a part of pollution theory. This theory suggests that jobs which are predominated by women offer lower wages than do jobs simply because of the presence of women within the occupation. Gender discrimination propels the notion that as a field or job becomes more predominated by women, it becomes less prestigious, turning away men and people who are discriminatory towards other genders.Goldin, C., (2014). A pollution theory of discrimination: male and female differences in occupations and earnings. In L. Platt, Boustan, C. Frydman, and R. A. Margo, eds. Human capital in history: The American record. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. pp. 313-348. The entering of women into specific occupations that have higher rates of gender discrimination suggests that less competent workers have begun to be hired or that the occupation is becoming deskilled. Men who are discriminatory towards other genders are reluctant to enter female-dominated occupations because of this and similarly resist the entrance of women into male-dominated occupations.Massey, Douglas. "Categorically Unequal: The American Stratification System". NY: Russell Sage Foundation, 2007. One "Gender Segregation in Occupations" study in Singapore by journalist Jessica Pan, "found that men abandoned formerly all-male professions in droves after women's participation reach 'tipping points,' fearing the social stigma and wage penalties associated with belonging to 'feminine' occupations." Femininity in a job or field is a threat to individuals who discriminate solely based on gender.
Gender discrimination in the workplace is still present today in many places of the world, which can be attributed to occupational segregation. Occupational segregation occurs when groups of people are distributed across occupations according to ascribed characteristics; in this case, gender. Occupational gender segregation can be understood to contain two components or dimensions; horizontal segregation and vertical segregation. With horizontal segregation, occupational sex segregation occurs as men and women are thought to possess different physical, emotional, and mental capabilities. With vertical segregation, occupational sex segregation occurs as occupations are stratified according to the power, authority, income, and prestige associated with the occupation and women and other genders are excluded from holding such jobs. Occupational segregation is found to slow economic growth and drive down wages. Women and other genders who are pushed into lower paid occupations add to the risk of ensuring family economic security.
As women entered the workforce in larger numbers since the 1960s, occupations have become segregated based on the amount of femininity or masculinity presupposed to be associated with each occupation. Census data suggests that while some occupations have become more gender integrated (mail carriers, bartenders, bus drivers, and real estate agents), occupations including teachers, nurses, secretaries, and librarians have become female-dominated while occupations including architects, electrical engineers, and airplane pilots remain predominantly male in composition. Based on the census data, women occupy the service sector jobs at higher rates than men. Women's over-representation in service sector jobs, as opposed to jobs that require managerial work acts as a reinforcement of women and men into traditional gender roles that causes gender inequality.Hurst, Charles, E. Social Inequality. 6th. Boston: Pearson Education, Inc., 2007. According to the World Bank's 2021 FINDEX database, there is a $1.7 trillion funding gap for formal, women-owned micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises globally, and more than 68% of small women-owned firms have insufficient or no access to financial services.
"The gender wage gap is an indicator of women's earnings compared with men's. It is figured by dividing the average annual earnings for women by the average annual earnings for men."