Question

level of gender discrimination

Answer 1

easuring gender inequality and women’s empowerment is essential to understand the determinants of gender gaps, evaluate policies and monitor countries’ progress. With this aim, over the past two decades, research has mainly been directed towards the development of composite indices. The purpose of this paper is to introduce a new and interdisciplinary perspective to the current debate on measuring gender inequality in human development. As a starting point, we develop a simple macroeconomic model of the interdependence between human development and gender inequality. We then introduce a biometric indicator, based on the ratio of female to male body mass index, to measure women’s empowerment at the country level. Finally, by using the latest available data, we examine the ability of this biometric indicator to capture countries’ performance in achieving gender equality. 

Answer 2

Equality between men and women, in terms of both opportunities and outcomes, is a fundamental dimension of human development (UNDP, 1995). Since the Beijing Declaration in 1995 (United Nations, 1996), significant progress has been made worldwide towards more gender-equal societies (World Bank, 2011). However, forms of gender discrimination still remain unquestionable realities in most parts of the world, particularly in developing countries (United Nations, 2014).