Womens Future Fund - WFF Update

WOMEN AND WORK

Women make about 71% of what men earn for full-year, full-time work.

Pay Equity Task Force, Pay Equity: A New Approach to a Fundamental Right, Ottawa, 2004

Education doesn’t change much. Women with university degrees earn 74% as much as men with degrees. This gap actually widened between 1995 and 2000. New immigrant women with university degrees fare worse, earning on average $14,000 less than Canadian-born women.

Statistics Canada, 1995 and 2000.
Pay Equity Task Force, Pay Equity: A New Approach to a Fundamental Right, Ottawa, 2004

This wage gap ranks Canada 38th in the world, behind countries such as Switzerland, Cambodia, Kenya, and the Czech Republic.

United Nations, The Human Development Index – Going beyond income, Country Fact Sheet: Canada.

Canada ranks 25th in the world in terms of the representation of women in professional and technical occupations, after the US, Barbados, Lithuania, and many other countries.

Ibid

Even in female-dominated professions such as teaching, nursing, and clerical work, men still earn more on average. In 2003, the average full-time, full-year female teacher earned $47,500 while her male counterpart earned $63,300. In sales and service industries, where women are concentrated, they earn 55.7 % of their male colleauges’ earnings for full-time, full-year work.

Statistics Canada, Women in Canada: A Gender-Based Statistical Report, 2006, p. 153

The majority of minimum wage and part time workers in Canada are women.

Statistics Canada, “Minimum Wage”, Perspectives on Labour and Income, vol. 7, no. 9, Sept. 2006, p. 14.(PDF)

37% of single mothers with paid employment are raising a family on less than $10/hour.

Campaign 2000, Report Card on Child Poverty in Canada, Toronto, 1999

WOMEN AND POVERTY

41.5% of single, widowed or divorced women over 65 are poor.
51.6% of women raising families by themselves are poor.

Statistics Canada Table 202-0802, http://www.statscan.ca/english/Pgdb/
famil41a.htm

Other factors besides gender further marginalize many women. Consider these average earnings.
• Canadian men: $36,865
• Visible minority men: $28,929
• Men with disabilities: $26,890
• Aboriginal men: $21,958
• Canadian women: $22,885
• Visible minority women: $20,043
• Women with disabilities: $17,230
• Aboriginal women: $16,519

Statistics Canada’s Participation and Activity Limitation Survey for the same year as the Census data, Statistics Canada, Women in Canada, p. 306.

WOMEN AND CHILDCARE

In a study of 11 Canadian cities, Montreal had childcare spaces for 45% of children under 12, while Saskatoon had spaces for just 6.9%. The average ratio of spaces to children was 10 – 16%. And yet 9 out of 10 women return to work within one year of becoming a parent.

Early Learning and Childcare Report, 2006 UNIPAC, Women and the Economy

Women earning higher incomes benefit more from EI maternity and parental leave benefits than women working part-time, young women and lower-income women. EI offers 55% of a woman’s salary, even when her full salary places her below the Low-Income Cut-Offs (“poverty line”). Women are also forced to pay into EI while not being able to afford to take much leave, thus subsidizing the leaves of better-off workers.

Human Resources Development Canada, “Who reports benefits?” in Unemployment Insurance-Employment Insurance Transition: An Evaluation of the Pre-2001 Maternity and Parental Benefits Prograin Canada (Ottawa: Human Resources Development Canada, Evaluation and Data Development, Strategic Policy 2001) http://www11.hrdc drhc.gc.ca/pls/edd/UIEIT_319004.htm Last updated: Apr.29/03

Women invest on average two hours more of unpaid work in the home per day than their male partners. That’s equivalent to 90 days a year.

Statistics Canada, 2005

WOMEN AND VIOLENCE

29% of Canadian women have been assaulted by their spouse. Of these, 45% suffered physical injuries, ranging from bruises to broken bones and miscarriages.

Statistics Canada, Family Violence in Canada, Ottawa, 1999

4 out of 5 people murdered by their spouses are women.

Statistics Canada, Homicide Statistics, 1998

98% of sex offenders are men, and 84% of their victims are women.

Statistics Canada, Sex Offenders, 1999

10% of sexual assaults on women are reported to police. This suggests there are 1,397 such assaults per day in Canada (reported and unreported).

Ontario Women’s Directorate, Dispelling the Myths about Sexual Assault, 1998

WOMEN AND POLITICS

21% of Canada’s current MPs are female. This ranks Canada 47th in the world, behind Rwanda and Iraq, among other countries. At this rate, women will achieve equal representation in the House of Commons in another 117 years.

Equal Voice, 2007

7 Cabinet Ministers in the current Harper government are women, out of 32. The peak came under Jean Chretien, at 16.

Ibid

None of Canada’s provincial premiers or big city mayors is female, and in 2006, women made up 21.4% of Canada's Municipal Councils.

Ibid and The Federation of Canadian Municipalities

Special thanks to the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women for information from their Fact Sheets.