Is there Gender Equality in the United States?
America's history has made significant steps towards gender equality. The election of the first female vice president marks one of the many other milestones the land has unlocked in its forge towards gender equality. But there is still more work to be done to achieve this fete. This study highlights three examples that illuminate how gender disparities in the United States continue to propagate through society's fabric.
We could argue that, in theory, businesses should be fundamentally driven to form gender-diverse leaderships. Gender balance in boards is not happening in reality. Firms that set efforts to diversify their boards pay steep prices. This fact is reported by a study done by the journal Organizational Science. The study drew its results from extensive historical data. According to the authors, the companies that diversified their boards suffered market penalties such as losing considerable market value. According to the study, a company loses an average of 2.3% in market value with every additional increase in boardroom gender diversity ( Solal & Snellman, 2019 ). The small percentage could translate to the loss of millions in market capitalization. This scenario is experienced due to the cynical belief that an increase in board multiplicity weakens the board's decision-making ability and that less capable boards support gender diversity.
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Men have an advantage over women in some sports—research published by the journal of sports economic reports that no gender advantage in horse racing. However, the author notes that women have to overcome substantial challenges to be rewarded the mounts they deserve. Out of the 120,000 data gathered on horse races between 2016 and 2018, only 12% of the participants were women (Alexander, 2019). The female athletes were not only underrepresented but also marginalized and participated in fewer races than fellow men. The female athletes had their races alongside the men and were paid less by up to 40% of their male counterparts for winning similar races.
The Journal of the American Medical Association published an article that reported trails of gender disparities are alive and well on the social networks, more so twitter. According to the study, female senior medical researchers averaged about 570 while male counterparts were twice as much ( Zhu et al., 2019 ). Male senior medical researchers averaged 400 retweets, and 578 likes a year on Twitter, while females averaged 207 retweets and 316 likes a year. According to the author, the research results proved that social networks unintentionally reinforce gender stereotypes.
What More Can Be Done to Ensure Gender Equality?
The first step towards achieving gender equality in the united states is to talk to women and girls. The voices of women and girls are too often excluded from national and global decision-making. The design of policies and federal programs should have women's needs central to their foundation. The proper value should also be given to women's work. The equal pay for equal work campaign should be promoted within the United States, and government policies set to enhance equal compensation to women are done as their male counterparts. The last step should be to get more women into power. Many systematic barriers limit women's success in the participation of legislation, among other development agendas. Women in leadership positions have more influence in legislating for women's issues and empowering others ( Solal & Snellman, 2019 ). Women have often received backlash for stepping into domains that were mainly men-dominated. With increased awareness campaigns, favorable policies, women-friendly legislation, and empowerment, men are likely to appreciate the contribution of women into the male-dominated domains and work together for the better of all.
References
Alexander D. Binder, P. W. G. (2019). In the Money: Gender and Jockey Success on the Thoroughbred Racetrack - Alexander D. Binder, Paul W. Grimes, Russell G. Winterbotham, 2021 . SAGE Journals. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1527002520975839.
Solal, I., & Snellman, K. (2019). Women don’t mean business? Gender penalty in board composition. Organization Science , 30 (6), 1270-1288.
Zhu, J. M., Pelullo, A. P., Hassan, S., Siderowf, L., Merchant, R. M., & Werner, R. M. (2019). Gender differences in Twitter use and influence among health policy and health services researchers. JAMA internal medicine , 179 (12), 1726-1729.
