132 years. This means that we will not be there, even our children, probably. 132 years is a very long time: what, according to World Economic Forum Report on the Global Gender Gap needed for bridge the gender gap and achieve equality between men and women in Italy. The bad news is that things are getting worse, not better. In fact, by 2020, the World Economic Forum has calculated that we will close the gap in 100 years. Then, with the pandemic, the situation of women worsened even more.

Months of isolation spent with children at home from school, job loss to keep up with family, difficulty returning to work: the pandemic has undoubtedly worsened women’s employment. But there is care work that still largely falls on the shoulders of women, horizontal and vertical segregation at the work level, and sexism that still pervades many areas of our society, even institutions. “The cost of living crisis has hit women disproportionately after the shock of losing their jobs during the pandemic. and the continued inadequacy of the aid infrastructure,” said Saadia Zahidi, CEO of the World Economic Forum. “Faced with a weak recovery, two sets of efforts must be made by government and business: targeted policies to support women’s return to the labor market. and developing female talent in the industries of the future.”

So far, of the 146 countries analyzed, only one in five has reduced the gender gap by at least 1% in the last year. Iceland is always at the top of the table: It has been the country with the lowest gender gap for 13 years now. Slightly lower are Finland, Norway, New Zealand and Sweden. This is followed by Rwanda, Nicaragua, Namibia, Ireland and Germany. At the bottom of the ranking is Afghanistan, followed by Pakistan, Congo and Iran. Italy is Al 63rd, next to Romania, Cyprus and Greece. Looking at the rest of Europe, we are not in the best shape: Spain, for example, in 17th, France in 15th.

l“Italy has lagged behind, especially in terms of economic opportunities for women. (ranks 110th for this measure), it also ranks 114th for wage inequality and 99th for labor force participation. Education does slightly better (59th, but we were 57th in 2021) and health care, which includes gender-based violence, is 108th, which, unfortunately, is not surprising. However, not bad for political power: we are in 40th place, having added a position compared to last year. The problem is that if the pace of equality continues at this pace, globally it will take 155 years to close the gender gap in political emancipation and 151 years to close the gender gap in economic participation and opportunity. Do we really want to wait all this time?