The differences between boys’ and girls’ schooling are greatest in regions with the lowest primary school completion rates and the lowest average incomes.

    East Asia and Pacific has almost achieved the 2005 target. In some Latin American countries girls’ enrollments exceed boys’.

     In Europe and Central Asia a strong tradition of educating girls needs to be sustained. In the Middle East and North Africa more girls are overcoming a bias against educating them.

Source: World Bank staff estimates.

     Although women’s participation in the labor force has increased in almost every region, their share of wage employment in the nonagricultural sector has changed little. Women typically occupy low-paid, low-status jobs or work in family enterprises. Wage employment in modern sectors of the economy offers greater security and access to other social and economic benefits. But even in the same sector, women usually earn less than men.

Source: World Bank staff estimates.

     Around the world women are underrepresented in parliaments and other high-level decision making bodies. Women’s presence in public life has been rising, but in 2004 women still occupied only 16 percent of the seats in national parliaments. Women’s representation at the ministerial and executive levels of government is even lower. 

     Some countries have formal limitations on women’s voting rights and election. In others, women have only recently acquired rights to participate in elections. In some places political parties have quota systems for women’s representation in their governing bodies, and a few countries have quotas for women’s representation in parliaments.

Source: World Bank staff estimates from Demographic and Health Survey data.