WASHINGTON — Laws guaranteeing equal economic opportunities for women are only half-enforced globally on average, according to the World Bank Group's latest "Women, Business and the Law" report released today.
The report marks the first time the World Bank has evaluated both the legal equality provisions on the books and the degree to which they are enforced. Legal experts surveyed for the study estimated that laws designed to encourage full economic participation by women are only 53 percent enforced, compared to an adequacy score of 67 out of 100 for the laws themselves.
Indermit Gill, Chief Economist and Senior Vice President for Development Economics at the World Bank Group, said the average country has fewer than half of the policies and services necessary for proper enforcement.
"Only 4 percent of women globally reside in economies that offer nearly full legal equality," Gill said.
The report assesses women's economic participation across 10 areas including safety from violence, access to childcare, entrepreneurship, employment protections, asset ownership and retirement security.
Safety from violence emerged as a critical gap. Globally, only one-third of necessary safety laws exist, and enforcement fails 80 percent of the time, according to Norman Loayza, Director of the World Bank's Policy Indicators Group. This leaves women unprotected at home, work and in public spaces.
The enforcement shortfalls have concrete consequences. Even with full enforcement of existing laws, women would possess barely two-thirds of the legal rights afforded to men.
Tea Trumbic, Manager of the "Women, Business and the Law" project and the report's lead author, said 1.2 billion young people—half of them girls—will enter the workforce over the next decade. Many will come of age in regions where they face the greatest barriers to economic participation, and where their contribution is most urgently needed.
Previous World Bank analysis estimated that closing the gender employment gap could increase long-term GDP per capita by nearly 20 percent on average across countries. Separate studies project global economic gains of $5 trillion to $6 trillion if women started and expanded businesses at the same rate as men.
Removing legal and institutional barriers to women's work would raise productivity through more efficient allocation of talent, according to the report.
