Women still face discrimination at work, at home and by science

March 8 is International Women's Day. Celebrated around the world, it's also an opportunity to highlight existing inequalities between the sexes and campaign to eliminate them.

There are countless studies that illustrate the discrimination still faced by women in all aspects of society. Here we look at three such studies, on jobs, gender-based violence and medical research.

Work: Women's situation "clearly worse than for men"

Despite the progress made in the past decades, the world of work remains one of the areas with the starkest inequalities between men and women. The gender pay gap in Catalonia was 20.6% in 2019, according to data published last month. This means that, on average, women in Catalonia earned €500 less than men per month.

In fact, one in five women in Catalonia who are in employment work part time, a rate (20%) that is 3.5 times greater than for men (5.6%). Furthermore, among women with a part-time contract, 43.5% say they work reduced hours because they cannot find full-time jobs.

These figures were published in a report by the CCOO union, called 'Equality and working conditions plans for women in Catalonia', presented on Wednesday.

According to the union, the general situation for working women is "clearly worse than for men." They call for the "real" implementation of equality plans and the "firm" prosecution of companies that fail to comply.

In Catalonia, 67% of women between the ages of 16 and 64 have a job, compared to 73.5% for men. The difference is especially noticeable in older age groups.

While for under 25s the employment rate is higher for women (31.1%) than for men (29.2%), among the largest section of the working population, 25 to 54-year-olds, the employment rate for women is just under 79%, compared to 86% for men.

'Broken ladder'

The CCOO union says the figures can be explained by the fact that women still tend to take care of domestic tasks.

"While men who are not working are retired or studying, women must devote time to household chores," Dolors Llobet said. Her colleague, Mentxu Gutíerrez, agreed: "If we continue to take responsibility for these tasks and we don't move to co-responsibility, we will be talking about the concept of the 'broken ladder', which does not allow us to pursue a career and develop professionally."

The situation is even harder for many foreign women, the CCOO report says, with an unemployment rate of 26.3%, much higher than the 8.8% average for women with Spanish nationality.

The report also reveals that the presence of women in managerial positions is lower than that of men, while in more precarious sectors the reverse is true.

Specifically, 5.6% of men hold senior management positions compared to 3.1% of women. On the other hand, 14.7% of men work in hospitality or retail, as opposed to 23.8% of women.

Gender-based violence: Public defenders' cases rising

One of the aims of International Women's Day is to bring attention to and speak out against gender-based violence.

The Barcelona Bar Association (ICAB) provided one measure of violence against women on Monday when they published findings showing that the number of appointments of public defenders to represent victims of gender-based violence is increasing.

In 2021, they reported 38.20% more cases of gender-based violence compared to 2020. The 2021 total of 5,300 cases in the Barcelona region was also higher than pre-pandemic figures, which were around 4,000 per year.

Furthermore, the trend is continuing to rise in 2022, with 870 lawyers appointed by the courts to represent victims in January and February alone.

Inequality in legal profession

Unveiling the figures on gender-based violence cases, Susana Ferrer, vice dean of ICAB, also took the opportunity to highlight the lack of equality within the legal profession.

"In Spain only 20% of partners in large law firms are women and only three large law firms are led by women," she said, continuing: "Data which contrasts with the figures in law faculties, where approximately 70% of students are women."

The head of the ICAB women's commission, Olga Arderiu, identified several wrongs still suffered by women due to gender, including the fact that the Social Security system punishes part-time work and gaps in working life. 

Arderiu also complained about the lack of legislation to deal with gender-based violence on social networks, which especially affects adolescents.

Alzheimer's: More female patients, but less participation in trials

Discrimination also extends to the world of medical research and health, as exemplified by one study from Ace Alzheimer Center Barcelona.

It showed that women are less likely to participate in clinical trials and are underrepresented in such trials, despite the fact that the prevalence of Alzheimer's disease is higher among women (7.1%) than among men (3.3%) over the age of 65.

The study focused on identifying the role of gender in screening trials for Alzheimer's and attributes women's underrepresentation to a lower level of education.

Older women, who have not had the same educational opportunities, in many cases do not have the necessary basic reading and writing skills for researchers to assess their cognitive performance in trials.

The study, published in the Alzheimer's Research & Therapy journal, looked at a cohort of more than 9,500 people – 70% women and 30% men – diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer's disease.