Combatting the Gender Employment Gap

The Gender Employment Gap in Malta, and how it can be fixed

Malta has always had issues with gender equality. However, ever since women were given the vote in 1947, Malta has slowly but surely dragged itself to advance female equality. However, Malta, even in 2019, still has major issues regarding female equality, namely, the employment gap.

Malta, according to statistics released by the EU Commission has an employment gap that currently stands at 22.1%. This is by far the highest in the EU, 2.3% higher than the second highest, which is Italy, standing at 19.8%. This number is considered by many to be too high for a country that prides itself on its progressivism. While the gender employment gap has decreased over the past decade and a half, from an astonishing number of 44.6% in 2005, this has been a relatively slow process. Even more so, to remain at the level Malta currently is is disappointing.

The main reasons behind the gap are numerous, from sexist cultural attitudes to the gender pay gap, to the hostile work environment many women find themselves in. While Malta has the third lowest gender employment gap in the EU, the gap is still there and is therefore still a factor in discouraging women to take up employment.

Malta's main issue though is the prevailing cultural attitude, which expects women to remain at home, the thinking behind this being that women are to take care of their families above all else. As Ms Magro herself says in the clip, this is in stark contrast to men, who are expected to continue working, whether they have a family or not. One of the main reasons though is the way women's skills are seen. For example, while nurses have far more responsibilities than doctors, ye they are looked at as lesser than doctors. The main reason for this though is the fact that the vast majority of people when thinking of a nurse think of a woman, and then thinking when thinking of a doctor think of a man.

Another symptom of this cultural attitude is the under-representation of women in high-level jobs. While the government says this is an issue, currently, not much is being done to combat this issue, and this, of all things, is a problem that ends up affecting many of the causes behind the gap. In fairness to the government though, it has taken other steps to help decrease the gap. Mainly this is, through helping decrease the pay gap and increase the benefits of maternity leave.

However, this again looks at the issue from a certain lens. that women are to be mothers, which makes it so that the government itself misses the point of its own advancements. This makes it so that the government is going about solving the issue in what can only be described as the wrong way, or at the very least, a very inefficient way.

The main idea behind this article though is to talk about how the gap can be fixed, and this falls to the government to change the manner in which it is tackling the issue. Rather than focusing on maternity leave, which is rather irrelevant to young women entering the workplace, the government should tackle issues that seriously affect women. This would be though harsher penalties on companies that discriminate against women, or through the introduction of quotas in leadership positions. While some look at quotas as unfair, the whole point of quotas is to make things fairer for the discriminated in question. If women were to be in more leadership roles, far fewer cases of women being put aside for jobs when equally qualified, or of being offered lower wages than their male counterparts.

Overall, while Malta has advanced in its treatment of women in the workplace, considerably more advancements have to take place for Malta to consider itself a fair and equal society.